23^^ HOUSE WE LIVE IN 





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THE HOUSE WE LIVE IN 



THE HOUSE WE LIVE IN 



The Making of the Body 



A Book f 07^ Home Reading, intended to Assist 

Mothers in Teachi7ig their Children 

How to Care for their Bodies, 

and the Evil Effects 

of Narcotics and 

Stimulants 



VESTA / FARNSWORTH 



" For we know that if our earthly house . . . were dissolved, we have a building 
of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." 2 Cor. 5 : i 

" What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in 
you, . . . and ye are not your own ? " i Cor. 6:19 



Pacific Press Publishmg Company 

OAKI^AND, CALIFORNIA 
SAN FRANCISCO KANSAS CITY NFW YORK 



TVSro COPI ES . < ECEl V so, 

Ln)rary of CoBgrM^ 
Office of tiig 

MAY 1 1 1900 

8egl»t«r of Cepyrlgfct^ 
SECOND COPY. 7^ 2- 




OP 



Z} 



1. 



61419 -13 

Entered according to Act of Congress in the A'ear 1900, by 

Pacific Press Pubi^ishing Company 
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington 



Entered at Stationers' Hall, London, England 




To 

MY DEAR FRIENDS THE CHILDREN 

and 

To All Who See the Creator 
in His Creative Work 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Houses and Temples ii 

The Outsidk of the Body - - - - - - - 17 

Substances in the Body ------- 23 

Our Frame ------._-. 27 

Proper Care of the Boxes ------ ^5 

The Walls of Our House ------- 40 

Weatherboards and Roofing ------ ^g 

The Cupola ---------- ^7 

Our Telephone Syste.ai ------- g^ 

The Hall or Passage - - - - - - - - 71 

Our Kitchen --------- yy 

The Eating Room - - - - 84 

Food and Fuel --------- g^ 

A Pumping Engine --------- 109 

The Caretaker --------- 118 

The Bath Room --------- 129 

How the House Is Heated ------ j^s 

The Music Room 147 

The Hearing Passage - - - - - - - 151 

Some Wonderful Windows 157 

A Good Servant -------- 165 

A Faithful Watchman - - - - - - - - 173 

A Gentle Nurse 178 

A Wicked Thief - - _ . 13^ 

A Cruel Murderer -------- 195 

Character of the Master 207 



THE HOUSE WE LIVE^IN 







HOUSES AND TEMPLES 

ELEN: See this picture, mother. How 
pretty the house looks, with its wide win- 
dows and porches! 
Mother : Yes, it is a fine picture, and 
such a house would make a lovely home. 
Men build better dwellings now than they 
did many years ago. 

Percy: Do people build the same kind of 
houses in all countries? 

Mother: Oh, no! If we should visit the 
Indians, we would find them living In rude 
tents called wigwams, or teepees, made of mats 
and the bark of trees. In some countries 
people live in tents. Where^it is very warm 
they build so they may keep cool. In cold 
climates they make their houses warm. Can 
you tell me some things which are used In 
building houses.-* 

(II) 



12 



The House We Live In. 



Elmer: Stone, brick, Iron, wood, paper, earth, and straw. 
The Esquimau Hves in a house made of large blocks of snow 
and ice. 

Mother : You would not think such a house very warm, 
but it is the best he can make. Perhaps you have noticed 

that some houses are large 
and some are small. Some 
have many rooms, others 
but few. They are made 
in many shapes and colors, 
and in some countries there 
are hardly two which look 
alike. 

Amy: Here is another 
picture. What kind of a 
<:p '^ < house is this, mother? 

Mother : That is called 
a temple. It is built for the 
purpose of worship. 

Helen: Is a meeting- 
house a temple.-* 
Mother: It might be called by that name, for It Is the 
house of God, where His people worship Him. But as 
we were looking at these pictures I have been thinking of 
another kind of house in which we all live, which Is more 
wonderful than any building ever made by men. There are 
a great number of these houses. All are made of the same 
things, all have the same kind of frame, all have the same 
number of rooms, and, though there are thousands of them 




Houses and Temples. 13 

in every country, they are all lighted, heated, finished, and 
furnished the same way. 

Percy: Oh, I know what you mean! You are thinking 
of our bodies. 

Mother: Yes; and if you study this house God made 
for you to live in, you will be ready to say, with King David, 
"I will praise Thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; 
marvelous are Thy works ; and that my soul knoweth right 
well." The more men study this body of ours, the more 
they find to make them wonder at the wisdom of its Maker. 
If a man invents a useful machine, such as a watch or an 
engine, he is praised and called a great man. But how few 
ever praise and thank the Lord for the body He has given 
them, and try to learn the best way to care for it ! 

Helen : I should like to know how to care for mine, but 
I never thought of my body as a house before. 

Mother: We may call it a house, because the Bible calls 
it so ; and, more than that, it says it is a temple. Listen to 
this verse: ''What? know ye not that your body is the 
temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have 
of God, and ye are not your own?" 

Amy : Then this house or temple of the body does not 
belong to us, mother, for it says, '*Ye are not your own." 

Percy : I see how it is. You know people sometimes 
build houses to rent, and the One who made the house we 
live in gives it to us for a home as long as we live, and He 
wants us to take good care of it. 

Mother : That is right. The house is loaned or. " rented " 
to us, as Percy says, for us to live in and care for. God 



14 The House We Live In. 

cares for it too, and if it wasn't for that it would have been 
destroyed long ago. Before any of us were old enough to 
know we had such a gift as our bodies, kind friends cared 
for them for us, and every moment our heavenly Father 
watches over us, for ''in Him we live, and move, and have 
our being." When we go to sleep He still keeps the heart 
engine pumping, and the parts which become worn out 
during the day are nicely mended without our thought 
or care. 

Elmer: I want the house I live in to be like that pretty 
temple we saw in the picture. 

Mother: Then my boy must be very careful to keep it 
clean, not only outside but inside as well. You know we 
sometimes see houses painted nicely outside, and we think 
what good homes they would make ; but when once .inside 
we find the rooms so dirty we want to get away. So boys 
and girls may be nicely dressed and look well outside, but 
if they do not eat good food and have good habits, their 
body-house is not fit to live in. 

Percy: Adam and Eve must have had fine, large houses. 

Helen: And they lasted a long time, too. Adam lived 
in his for over nine hundred years. 

Mother: It is said that men keep building better houses 
all the time, but the first body-house God made was the 
best ever seen in this world. 

Amy: But why are they not made good and lasting now, 
mother? 

Mother: One reason is because we do not use them 
well. Many persons would do better in caring for them- 



Houses and Temples. 15 

selves If they knew better how to do it. If I gave you a 
costly watch, Percy, what is the first thing you would want 
to know about it? 

Percy: How to take care of it. 

Mother: Yes, you would find out how and when to 
wind it, and just how to use it so it would keep good time. 
We should be even more careful to learn all we can about 
our bodies. We should learn for what each part was made, 
and how to keep it in good order. Men have taken bodies 
like ours apart, just as a watchmaker takes out all the wheels 
of a watch, and they have found out many things about them 
in this way. We should learn all we can about how to keep 
well and strong. If we are ill we make much trouble for 
others, and must suffer ourselves. If we are well we shall 
be a help and blessing to all around us. Not long ago I 
read this prayer of a little girl for her body: — 

**Dear God, bless my two little eyes, and make them 
twinkle happy. Bless my two ears, and help me to 
hear mother call me. Bless my two lips, and make them 
speak kind and true. Bless my two hands, and make them 
good and not touch what they mustn't. Bless my two 
feet, and make them go where they ought to. Bless my 
heart, and make it love God and my father and mother 
and everybody. Please let ugly sin never get hold of 
me — never, never!" 

"The Lord my body did prepare 

My dwelling-place to be, 

And still it is a temple where 

He daily meets with me. 



1 6 The House We Live In. 

" My head, my hands, my heart are His; 
He knows my being well; 
And all its many mysteries 
My Lord alone can tell. 

' ' To walk in ways of wickedness 
My feet can not afford; 
For all the powers I possess 
Are holy to the Lord. 

"I'll pray to Him from day to day 
To lead my steps aright, 
That I along His heavenly way 
May be a shining light. 

' ' And He will keep my temple free 
From every touch of sin; 
He truly saves and cleanses me, 
That He may dwell within. 

"My eyes must see the good and true; 
My ears must hear His voice; 
My hands be ever glad to do 
My heavenly Father's choice." 

— C M. Snow, 




THE OUTSIDE 
OF THE BODY 




OTHER: Let us look at the out- 
side of our house before we try to 
see how it is made and furnished 
inside. I think you know now 
that when I am talking about a 
house or temple I mean the body. 
In some ways our bodies are like 

trees as well as houses. Look at this picture 

and tell me what you see. 

Percy: A tree with a straight stem or trunk. 

It also has branches, called limbs, and is covered 

with bark. 

Amy: And it has roots, which hold it fast 

in the ground. 

Mother: Yes, trees are made to stand in 

one place while they live, and so they have 

roots. We have limbs like the tree, but our 

lower limbs are used to carry us from place to 

place, for we were not made to stand still. 

Can you think of another way in which we 

are like the tree? 

2 (17) 





1 8 The House We Live In. 

Helen: Oh, I know! The middle part of the body 
is called the trunk. 

Mother : Can you think of any other kind of trunk 
than the trunk of a tree or the trunk of the body ? 

Amy : A trunk in which to put 
clothes. 

Mother: Yes, such trunks are 

useful to carry clothes. The upper 

part of the trunk of the body, or 

the part between the arms, is called 

"the chest." Sometime we will try 

to learn what is packed away so nicely in the chest, or 

trunk, of the body, but we will only look outside now. 

What is on top of the trunk ? 

Helen : A strong, shell-shaped box made of bones, 
called the head. 

Mother : This is what we might call the jewel-case, or 
the best part of all, for without it all parts of the body 
would be useless. Here we find the eyes, nose, mouth, and 
ears; and the head is fastened to the trunk of the body by 
the neck. How many limbs have we.'^ 

Percy: We have two arms and two legs, and these 
are called our limbs. 

Mother: Now I think you can name the main parts 
of the body. What are they? 

Helen : The head, trunk, and limbs. 
Mother : You said the tree was covered with bark. 
Look at your hand. With what is it covered ? 
Amy: With skin. 



The Outside of the Body. 19 

Mother: Yes; we will talk more about this soft covering 
of the body at another time. We found these body-houses 
of ours are made to walk, work, run, jump, and do many other 
things. How are our limbs different from those of a tree? 

Percy: They have joints so they can move many ways. 

Mother : You may all put your arms out straight. Now 
raise them above your head and then touch your head with- 
out bending them. 

Helen: We can't do it, mother. 

Mother: Let us see, then, how many joints, or bending- 
places, we have. We will call them the hinges of our house, 
for they help us to use our limbs, just as the hinges of a door 
help us to open or close the door. Please bend your arm 
and tell me how many parts it has. 

Percy : My arm has two parts. 

Mother: What do you think would be a good name 
for the part near your shoulder? 

Amy: The top arm, or upper arm. 

Mother: I think upper arm is best. Now if that part 
is the upper arm, what would you call the other part? 

Elmer : The lower arm. 

Mother: It is also called the forearm. Now move 
your elbow joint backward and forward, and tell me what 
kind of joint it Is. 

Helen: It is like a door hinge, for I can move It only 
two ways. 

Mother: Yes, the elbow joint unites the upper and 
lower arm, and it can swing only one way. What shall 
we call the joint that joins the upper arm to the shoulder? 



20 



The House We Live In. 




Percy: The shoulder joint. 
Mother: Is this joint like 
the one in your elbow ? 

Helen : No, for I can 
swing my arm backward or 
forward or any way I like. 

Mother : That is because 
it has a different joint than 
your elbow. It is called a "ball-and-socket" joint; 
that is, one end of the bone is shaped like a ball, and this 
fits into a hole shaped like a cup in another bone, like the 
one you see in the picture. This shows the hip joint, which 
is also a ball-and-socket joint, the same as we found in the 
shoulder. Now what is the joint called at the lower end 
of the forearm.-^ 

Amy: It is called the wrist. 

Mother: The wrist is a joint that moves very easily in 
many different ways. Now how many joints, or bending- 
places, have we found in the arm '^ 
Percy: The arm has three joints. 

Mother: Elmer, you may take this ball. With what 
do you hold it.'^ 

Elmer: With my hand. 

Mother: Tell me some ways in which we use our hands. 
Helen : We hold, push, pull, lift, catch, and feel with 
our hands. 

Mother: The inside is called the palm of the hand. 
What do you find at the ends of your hands ? 
Amy: Fingers. 



The Outside of the Body. 



21 



Mother: Look at your fingers. Are they all alike? 

Percy: One is much shorter than the others; all are 
different in length, and one is very small. 

Mother : What do you call your short finger ? 

Elmer : My thumb. 

Mother : You would find it hard to button your clothes 
and do many other things if you had no thumbs. A dog 
has no fingers, and if he wishes to hold or carry anything, 
he does it with his teeth. The first finger is called the 
forefinger, or index finger, be- 
cause it comes first, and we 
use it to point with. The 
second is the middle finger; 
then we have the third linger; 
and the fourth is called the 
Httle finger, because it is the 
wee, tiny one of all. Open and 
shut your hands quickly. What 
do you call the parts of your 
fingers where you bend them ? 

Helen : Finger joints and knuckles. 

Mother : You see there are many joints in the hands, 
so we can move them easily and quickly. What do you 
find on the ends of your -fingers? 

Amy: Finger-nails. 

Mother : These hard, horny nails protect the ends of 
the fingers, and give them strength. Our hands were given 
us to help ourselves and others, and we should keep them 
neat and clean. They were not made to strike or steal. 




22 The House We Live In. 

Amy : I read this verse about our hands not long ago:— 

* ' Hands were made to be useful, 
If you teach them the way; 
Therefore for yourself or neighbor 
Make them useful every day." 

Percy: You haven't told us about the lower limbs 
yet, mother. 

Mother: No; and any boy or girl who enjoys running 
and jumping would think theirs a hard lot if they had 
no legs. 

Elmer: I saw a boy with only one not long ago. 

Mother: It is a great loss when a person loses an arm 
or a leg. Such people are called cripples. How many 
parts has each leg? 

Amy: Each one has two parts. 

Mother : And how many joints has the leg ? 

Helen: Three joints. 

Mother: That is right. The one at the hip, as I have 
said, is a ball-and-socket joint; the one at the knee is a 
hinge joint, and the ankle is quite like the wrist. Then 
we have the foot, with a number of small joints, like 
the hand. 

Percy: But we have toes on our feet instead of fingers; 
still there is the same number. 

Mother : Yes, and some people can use their toes to 
draw pictures, write, and do many other things. Now we 
have found what our body-house is like on the outside, 
and we see how well each part is made for the work given 
it to do. 





OTHER: Percy, do you remember what men 
use in building houses ? 

Percy: They use stone, wood, brick, iron, 
glass, lime, and paper. 

Helen: And some houses are made of 
earth and straw. 

Mother: Yes, and some of these things 
are found in the body-house. 
Amy : Why, mother, we are not made of wood, stone, 
glass, or lime ! 

Mother: That is true; yet some of these very things 
are in your body. Those who have studied the blood tell 
us it is iron, partly, that gives it its rich red color. You 
saw what a pretty red it is when you cut your finger 
to-day, Helen. Some of the things of which glass is made 
are in our hair and finger-nails, and our bones would soon 
become useless if we did not give them plenty of lime. 

Percy : But how do the iron and lime get inside of 
us? That is what 1 would like to know. 

Mother: It does seem strange, but the houses we live 
in are made of what we eat. I once knew a young lady 
who thought she needed more iron in her blood, so she 

(23) 



24 



The House We Live In. 



put some nails in water and let them stay till it was full 
of iron rust, and then she drank it. Perhaps if she had 
thought her bones needed lime, she would have taken lime 
water; but this is not the proper way to get iron and lime 
"inside of us," as Percy says. We can not eat iron and 
lime, but grains and fruits can, and we eat the grains 
and fruits. Iron is found in apples, tomatoes, and straw- 
berries. We get lime in wheat, peas, beans, and other 
foods. Have you noticed how the men are building that 
brick house across the street ? 

Amy: They put one brick 
on top of another, till thousands 
of them are used in making one 
house. 

Mother : Well, that is the 
way the house we live in is built, 
only instead of bricks it is made 
up of what are called "cells." 
These cells are little bags filled 
with something that looks like 
jelly. They are so very small we 

can not see them at all unless we look through a glass 
which makes them seem much larger than they really are. 
Some of these powerful glasses make a speck of dust look 
as big as a large rock. 

Elmer: I wish we could see some cells. 

Mother: Here is a picture of some kinds. You see 
they are not all alike. Some are round, others are flat, or 
narrow, or long, or short; so you see they are of all shapes 




Substances in the Body 



25 



and sizes. Some are so very tiny it would take three or 
four thousand to make a row an inch in length. Others 
are large enough so we can almost see them without a 
glass. Some have no color at all; others are 
ight colored, and some are quite black. There 
are millions of cells in one drop of blood. 
Your skin seems like one piece, yet it, too, 
is made of layers of cells. If we should look 
through a strong glass at a tiny piece of 
potato, wheat, and some oatmeal, we would 
find they are all made of cells. 

Percy: And do the cells last as long 
as we live, mother.'^ 

Mother: No, they keep changing all 

the time. When we walk, run, talk, think, 

or do anything, some of these cells die, 

and others take their places. The new 

ones are just like the old; for if they 

were not, our appearance would so 

change that our best friends would not 

know us. While boys and girls are 

growing, they are putting many new cells into 

the house they live in. This is the reason 

auntie said the other day that she hardly knew 

you when she had not seen you for a year. 

Amy: What are the cells made of, mother? 

Mother : They are made of the food we eat. This 

shows we should be careful to put the very best things we 

can get into our body-building — I mean such as the body 




26 The House We Live In. 

can use, for what we lihe best is not always what is needed 
to build up and strengthen us. When you get hungry, 
that is the call of the body for food to make more cells, 
just as the mason calls, ''More mortar," or, ** More brick," 
so he can build his wall higher and stronger. If his mortar 
has but little lime, or is badly mixed, or he has only broken, 
badly-shaped brick, the wall will not be strong or beautiful. 
So if we give the body wrong kinds of food, it can not 
build such a house as you and I wish to live in. 

Helen: If moving about kills the cells, will they live 
longer if we keep still } 

Mother: No, they are made to live just so long, and 
will die anyway. If we should not work or play, the dead 
cells would stay in the body, and make no end of mischief; 
but when we move about, it helps to carry them away, and 
new ones take their places. So you need not be afraid to 
run and jump, play and work; for the cells will take care 
to keep the house you live in all right, if you only give 
them the right kind of food, and not too much of it. 



PDAM& 





OTHER: Every building must have a founda- 
tion and a frame of some kind to make it 
strong and give it shape. It is the same with 
the house we call our 



body. The frames 
of houses which men 
build are made of wood or iron ; 
but the framework of the body is 
built of bones. Perhaps you have 
noticed that in the frames of build- 
ings some pieces of timber are 
short, and some are long, and they 
are cut into many different shapes 
and sizes. So it is with the bones 
of the body. How many do you 
think it takes to make our frame? 

Helen: About fifty. 

Percy: I guess one hundred. 

Mother: Not quite right, for 
there are over two hundred. All 




(27) 



28 



The House We Live In. 




the bones together are called the skeleton. The frame of 

a house divides it into rooms, and on it are fastened the 

boards, laths, and shingles. In the house in 

which we live the flesh is fastened to the bones, 

and the whole is covered with skin. This 

framework also protects the curious rooms 

inside the trunk of the body. The largest 

bone in our frame is the leg bone, which 

reaches from the hip to the knee. It is called 

the femur, or thigh bone. 

Elmer: Are the bones solid, mother? 
Mother: No; I have brought some pic- 
tures to show you how they look, for we can 
not see our own bones. One of them shows 
a bone that is sawed through lengthwise. You 
see the larger part at the end is full of little 
holes, like a sponge. This makes it light and 
strong. There is a hollow place in long bones 
filled with marrow. It also fills the spongy 
parts. Marrow is made of fat and cells. 

You must not think that live bones look like one which 

has been lying out- 
of-doors a long time. 
Live bones are full 
of blood and have a 
pinkish color. They 
also have an outside 
skin, which can be peeled ofT, as you see in this picture. 
Amy: What are the bones made of? 




The thigh bune. 




A bone with the outside skin partly peeled off. 



Our Frame. 



29 




End of a bone 
sawed open. 



Mother: Of animal and 

earthy matter. You can take 

the animal matter out of a 

bone by burning it in the 

fire. It will then be white 

and brittle. If you soak a 

bone in a kind of acid, the 

earthy matter will come out, 

and it will then be so soft you can tie it in a knot like this. 

When children are very young, their 
bones are soft and easily bent. This 
is because there is more animal than 
earthy matter. Children sometimes 
get hard falls, and their bones bend 
but do not break. Some, when 
very young, have legs that are bent 
like a bow. This is caused by stand- 
ing and walking before the bones are strong enough to bear 

the weight of the body, or by disease. 

In very old people the bones contain more earthy matter, 

and they break easily. Grand'fa-ther and grand'moth-er 

must be careful not to fall, for if they break a bone it will 

take a long time to heal. 

When we take a baby, we should not lift him by his 

arms, and we must hold him so his bones will not grow out 

of shape. As he grows older, enough earthy matter will 

go into his bones to make them hard and strong. 

Percy: But you said there was lime in the bones, 

mother. 




A bone tied in a knot, after the earthy matter 
has beeti removed by an acid 



30 



The House We Live In. 



■^m. 






^'fVe should not lift him by his arms." 



Mother: Yes, the earthy 
matter is partly lime. The 
blood goes into the bones 
through tiny blood-vessels, 
and at all times of day and 
night the bones keep eating 
their breakfasts, dinners, and 
suppers of lime, which 
they find in the blood. 

Helen: What kind of 
food is best for the bones ? 
Mother: Good whole- 
wheat bread will furnish 
them all they need. Peas and beans are also good. 

We will now look at the largest bones of our body 
frame, and see if we can learn something of their size and 
shape. We will not try to learn their hard names now, 
but will leave that till we are older. 

We will begin with the bones of the head. They 
form what is called the skull. It is made of a number 
of bones, joined like two saws with the teeth hooked 
together. The "chin bone," or jaw bone, is one of the ^ 
bones of the head. 

Let me show you a picture of one of 
the most wonderful bones of the body. 
It is called the sphiey or spinal column. 
Perhaps you can feel some little knobs or 
ridges in your back. The back-bone is 
made of twenty-four little bones piled one 



xck-boiw. 




Skull. 



Our Frame. 



31 




Reels of cotton. 



on top of another. Suppose you had twenty-four spools or 
reels of cotton, and you should run a string through 
them. When you hold them upright, you see you can — ^ 
bend them any way you wish, or keep them straight. 
Now if each spool had three wings like the one in the picture, 
they would be shaped very much like the bones that form 
the spine. The string is like the marrow, or "spinal cord," 
which passes through the spinal column from top to bottom. 

The bones which make up the 
lower part of the spine are much 
larger than those at the top. 
Little soft cushions are placed be- 
tween all these bones, something 
like India-rubber. These cushions 
are to keep the body and brain 
from being jarred, just as the springs in our carriage help 
you to ride easily. They also help us to bend the body 
backward or forward as we choose. You see if the spine 
was one long straight bone we could not bend at all. If 
we keep bending over while walking or working, after 
a time the cushions will get used to that position and 
we shall have a bad figure. 

Elmer: The boy with his hands in his pockets 
does not have a good figure. 

Mother: No; and if he were to go into the 
army, the first thing he would have to learn would 
be to ''straighten up," and give his spinal column 
a chance to grow the right way. 

Now we will look at the ribs. They are 





The House We Live In. 




fastened to the spinal column at the 
back, and all but four are fastened to 
the breast-bone in front. There are 
twelve ribs on each side. There are 
two bones on the upper part of the 
back, which seem to dance every time 
you move your arm. These are the 
''shoulder blades." They are thin, flat 
bones, which help 

make the shoulder joint. You can feel 

two bones near your neck in front, which 

are called ''collar bones." They are 

shaped much like the letter f, and serve 

to preserve the shape of the shoulders. 
Amy: How many bones do we have 

in our arms, mother.'^ 

Mother: There are three in each 

arm, — one from the shoulder to the elbow, 

and two from the elbow to the wrist. 

There are a large number of bones in the 

. . - Bones of the arm. 

wrist and hand 

The middle part of the body be- 
low the spinal column is called the 
pelvis. In this picture we see two 
curious bones. These are the hip 
bones. They are like the sills of a 
house, which, you know, are large 
and strong. There is a deep hole in 
each one as larg^e as a toy teacup, 

The pelvis. ^ / r' 





Our Frame. 



ZZ 



which holds the round head of the leg bone. There are three 
bones in each leg, the same as in the arm, one from the 
hip to the knee, and two from the knee to the 
ankle, besides a funny little bone or cap which 
covers the knee. Then we come to the ankle 
bones and bones of the feet. 

Helen: How do the bones stay in their 
proper places, mother .-^ I should think they would 
fall apart. 

Mother: They would if they were not tied 
together. 

Elmer: But what are they tied with.^ 
Mother: With strong white bands or cords 
called lig'a-ments. Perhaps you have seen them on 
the leg of a chicken. When a joint is "sprained," 
that means the lig'a-ments are stretched or hurt 
in some way. 

Amy: I should think the bones would get 
dry so they would squeak and 
rub hard against one another. 

Mother: So they would if the 
Maker of the body-house had not put 
soft cushions of gristle or car'ti-lage be- 
tween them. A soft, thin skin covers 
them, which pours "joint water" over 
the ends, and keeps them oiled just 
right, so they bend easily, and never 
squeak at all. You have seen the 
driver of an engine oiling it so it 



W'^'1'it bones tied together. 



Bones of the 
leg midfoot. 




34 The House We Live In. 

would run easily and not wear out; but think of a machine 
which will mend and oil itself for seventy years without 
wearing out ! We have a most wonderful frame. The Bible 
says, ''Thou hast fenced me with bones and sinews," and, 
''He knoweth our frame." Sometimes if we are ill a lono- 
time "the bones that were not seen stick out;" but when 
we are well, flesh covers them over so we hardly know we 
have any bones at all. 

I once read a poem which I will repeat for you. It 
may help you to remember how many bones we have and 
where they are: — 

"How many bones in the human head? 
Eight, my child, as I've often said. 
How many bones in the human spine? 
Twenty-six, Hke a climbing vine. 
How many bones in the human chest? 
Twenty-four ribs, and four of the rest. 
How many bones in the human arm? 
In each one, two in each forearm. 
How many bones in the human wrist ? 
Eight in each if none are missed. 
How many bones in the fingers ten? 
Twenty-eight, and by joints they bend. 
How many bones in the human hip? 
One in each; Hke a dish they dip. 
How many bones in the human knees? 
One in each, the knee-pan, please. 
How many bones in the ankles strong? 
Seven in each, but none are long. 
How many bones in the toes, half a score? 
Twenty-eight, and there are no more. 
And now altogether these many bones fix, 
And they count in the body two hundred and six. 
And now and then a bone I should think 
That forms on a joint, or to fill up a chink, 
A ses'a-moid bone, or a wormian, we call. 
And now we may rest, for w^e've told them all." 




o G> C=> VI O . 



OF THE BONES 



ELEN: What's the matter with this house, 
mother? It seems to be all out of shape. 
Mother: Perhaps it is very old and the 
frame has decayed so it leans far over to one 
side. It is unsafe to live in such houses, for 
they may tumble down if a strong wind comes 

along. I have seen some body-houses 

which look very much like this to me. 

Here is one of them. See how this 

boy's shoulders are bent forward, and 

his whole body is wrong. If some 

disease, as consumption, should come 

along, like a strong wind, I fear his 

house would go down. Some one 

should say to him, ''Straighten up, 

young man ; throw your shoulders 

back, and you will look more manly 



and will live much lono-er." 




See how this boy's shoulders 
are bent forward.^'' 



Percy: I have seen some boys 
at school bending over their desk when studying and 
writing. Is that good for the bones .'^ 

Mother: No; boys and girls should sit straight, stand 

(35) 



36 



The House We Live In. 



straight, and walk straight. If they do not, after a time 
the cushions between the bones in the spine will grow 
thicker on one side than on the other, and the back-bone 
will become crooked. You know soldiers stand erect and 

have fine forms. How much better 
this man looks than the one who 
bends over! Do not form the habit 
of bending forward while sitting or 
standing. The one who made the 
body "made man upright," and in 
this he is different from the birds, 
beasts, or fishes. 

Elmer: Can the bones be broken, 
mother? 

Mother: Yes, and it is a sad 

thing for one to get broken, for it 

is very painful and takes a long time 

to heal. Children should be careful when jumping, when 

climbing trees, or when they go in any place where they 

may fall and break their bones. 

Many persons give the bones of the feet a wrong shape 
by wearing tight boots or shoes. This causes *' corns" to 
grow, which become very sore and painful. Perhaps you 
have heard how the Chinese women bind the feet of their 
little girls, and pinch them up, till they look more like clubs 
than like feet. The little one often cries and moans for 
days, but the mother and father pay no attention to her 
sufferings, for they think it would never do for their girl 
to have big feet. 




"Boys should sit straight. 



Prope7^ Care of the Bones 

Amy: O, yes, niother; here is the pic- 
ture of a woman with little feet! See her 
tiny shoes! They are no longer than a 
baby's. In the other picture you see one 
of her feet with all the toes doubled under. 
I don't see how she can walk at all. 

Helen: She must be silly. I think 
God knew how big to make our feet, as 
well as other parts of the body. 

Mother: That is true, but the poor 
Chinese women do not know better, and 
they think Christian women are more 
foolish than Chinese women, and that 
they bind the bones in a way they them- 
selves would never dream of doing. 
Helen: How, mother.^ 
Mother: They say Christian women 
and girls squeeze the waist so tight it 
gives no room for some of the most important 

parts of the body-house. I think 
you said, Helen, that God 
knew how big to make our 
feet. Do you think He 
knew how big to make the 
waist '^. 

Helen: I suppose so, 
but a small waist looks so 
much better than a large 
one. 

(37) 




"'See her tiny shoes P 




'All the toes doubled 
under, ' ' 



3^ 



The Hi 



ouse 



We Live In. 



Mother: And the Chinese lady thinks her little feet 
are so much prettier than large ones, and she would rather 
suffer the pain, and hobble around all her life leaning on a 
servant, than be out of fashion. The Christian woman 
thinks a small waist is pretty, so she makes her clothes 
tight, and suffers all kinds of aches, 
rather than let the body remain as 
God made it. What is the difference? 
Here is a picture of the ribs as God 
made them, and here is one after 
the waist has been bound around 
with tight dresses. 
\ If we saw a man put- 

ting iron bands around 
his house we would think 
the one who built it had 
made some mistake or it 
would not need anything 
to hold it together. If people feel as though they would 
''fall to pieces," or if they have the backache, when their 
clothes are loose, it shows they have abused the muscles 
of the body and made weak that which God made strong. 
Amy: Is it wrong to wear tight clothing, mother? 
Mother: Yes; it is very hurtful for girls to wear their 
dresses even a little tight, for the bones are soft and easily 
pressed out of place. We should wear warm, loose cloth- 
ing on all parts of the body, and never, never squeeze the 
feet, waist, or any other part out of shape. Your arm 
would be very painful with a tight band around it, but that 




'Here is a 
picture of the 
ribs as God 
made them, 
and here is one 
after the waist 
has been botmd 
around with 
tight dresses.'" 



P^^oper Care of the Bones. ^9 

would not do as much harm as tight shoes or tight bands 
around the waist. It is better to be healthy than to be in 
fashion. 

You remember that the blood flows through the bones 
to feed and make them grow. Good blood will make them 
strong and healthy. Children sometimes have a disease 
called the ''rickets." This shows that their bones are soft 
and need more lime. They should eat plenty of good 
brown bread. 

No boy who wishes to grow large and strong should 
touch beer or tobacco. These poisons in the blood will 
make the bony framework of the body small and weak. 
The size of the man depends on his frame. Many boys 
are making their bodies and minds very small by smoking 
cigarettes. By using strong drink or tobacco the house we 
live in is defiled. The blood and all the body, inside and 
out, becomes soiled and filthy. "If any man defile the 
temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of 
God is holy, which temple ye are." If one should go into 
a beautiful temple and break the windows, stain the white 
marble walls, and cover the floor with filth, we would think 
they did wrong. How much worse to destroy the wonder- 
ful, living temple which God Himself has built! 




LMER: I don't like to look at pic- 
tures of bones and skeletons, mother. 
Mother: No; like the framework 
lll^^^^-^'^ ' - - of a house, they are not pretty, and 

^ yet they give shape to what we do 
ike to see. When your father built this 
house, do you remember how he made 
the walls ? 

Percy: The spaces between the tim- 
bers were filled with bricks, so there was 
a solid wall. 

Mother: Well, it is that way in the 
body-house. The bones are all covered over and 
filled in between with muscles. It is these which 
make the cheeks so plump, and give the whole body its 
round, pleasing form. It is the muscles which move the 
bones. 

Amy: But what is a muscle.'^ 

Mother: You have seen lean meat, have you not.^ 

That is muscle. When boiled it seems to be made up of 

little bundles of tiny threads of fibers, each wrapped in its 

own thin blanket. Here Is a picture of a muscle. These 

(40) 




'Ilic Walls of Ou7' House. 



41 



small threads are not twisted together, but are laid side by 
side. It takes one thousand seven hundred of them to 
make a muscle an inch thick in children, 
but in grown people it takes only five 
hundred. 

Helen: Are the muscles fastened to 
the bones, mother.-* 

Mother:^ Yes; many muscles are joined 
to the bones by strong cords, called ten- 
dons. The picture shows the muscles of the 
arm, with their tapering tendons at the wrist. 
You see our muscles end in these little 
ropes, or cords, to save room. What a large 
wrist we would have if the muscles were as 
large there as in the arm! Now grasp your 
right arm and open and shut the fingers of 
your right hand. What do you feel ? 
Percy: The flesh moves. 
Mother: That is because the muscles 
of your arm pull back when you shut your 

fingers, and stretch out when you open them. 

They are some like this piece of India rubber. 

If you pull it out, it gets thinner, and if you 

let go, it snaps back and becomes short and 

thick. Perhaps you have seen the leg of 

a fowl cut off at the joint, and know if 

\ you take hold of the strong cords you 

can move the toes up or down. So the 

Muscles of muscles and tendons move in our feet 




'Muscles of the arm, with 
their tapering tendons at 
the wrist.''' 




the hand. 



42 



The House We Live Ii 



and hands in the same way. Every step we take, one 
muscle Hfts the toes in front, and another pulls up the 
heel behind. 

If a person sits still much of the time, he will have 
weak, small muscles, because he does not use them. That 
is one reason why people are so very weak after being ill. 
When we use our muscles, they grow large and strong. 
You have seen the blacksmith's arm and noticed how lar^e 
and strong it is. To use our muscles does not wear them 
out, but does them good. 

Elmer: I should think the muscles were our servants, 
to do whatever we wish done. 

Mother: Yes; and better servants no pe.'son ever had. 
If the brain says, "I w^nt a book," the muscles of the legs 
carry the body where the book is ; those 
of the eye look for it ; those in the arm 
and hand lift it ; and the master of the 
house gets what he wants. We can not 
move or do anything without these serv- 
ants to help us. 

Amy: It must take a good many to 
serve one who wants as many things as 
I do. 

Helen: I read not long ago there 
were about five hundred of them, big 
and little, and that they, have many 
shapes and sizes. 

Mother: That is true; and one who 
has so many servants as that, ought to 




The Walls of Our House. 43 

be able to wait on himself, and help other people, too. 
Some of these servants, those in the feet, legs, arms, and 
hands, wait to be told what to do. Others go to work 
and keep at it without telling, and they will work even 
though the one living in the house should tell them to 
stop. When you wink, you do it without thinking, for 
the little muscles over the eye know it is their duty to 
keep the eye clean and bright, and they keep at their work 
even though you should tell them to keep still. Your 
heart is a hollow muscle, and it works faithfully night 
and day as long as you live. The stomach is made of 
muscles, which take care of your breakfast and dinner with- 
out a word from you ; and there are many more of these 
faithful servants who work to keep our house in order. 

Percy: But don't the muscles get tired, mother? 

Mother: Yes; and when they ask for rest, we should 
give it to them. We do not need to sit still and do 
nothing in order to rest the muscles. If we have been 
studying, it rests them to sweep the floor, hoe in the 
garden, or work or play. If we have been playing or work- 
ing hard, it rests us to sit down and read or study. Change 
of work is better than to be idle. Walking, running, or 
working makes the muscles grow large and strong. 

We must also have plenty of sleep. A boy or girl 
who works and plays out in the fresh air and sunshine, 
will be strong and well, while those who sit in the house 
will be weak and sickly. But it is not best to work the 
muscles till they are ''all tired out," for using them too 
much is nearly as bad as not using them at all. 



44 



The House We Live In. 



Helen: I read a story not long ago about the king of 
a tribe in Africa. He did not move about or work, so he 
became ill. He sent for his doctor, who saw that all he 
needed was to use his muscles, but he did not dare tell 
him to go to work, so he made two large clubs, and told 
the king the medicine which would make him well was in 
the handles, and if he would swing the clubs each day till 
his body was moist, the medicine would go from the clubs 




''Giving his muscles exercised 

into his hands, and make him strong and well. The king 
did as the doctor said. Each day he swung his clubs in 
the open air, and he soon became strong. He thought he 
had a very skilful doctor, and praised him for his great cure. 
Mother: And yet it was only giving his muscles exer- 
cise which helped him so much. This shows the importance 
of using them. 



The Walls of Our House. 45 

Elmer: Do we need anything else to make the muscles 
strong, mother? 

Mother : Yes ; one of the best things to make them 
strong is plenty of good, plain food. As the muscles are 
used, they wear out, and must have new timber to build 
themselves up. You would think it strange if a carpenter 
brought brick, mortar, glass, and timber to mend a house, 
and without his help each part should take just what it 
needed, putting in half a dozen bricks in the chimney, a 
board in the floor, a new pane of glass in the window, and 
some mortar in the right place. But this is what the house 
we live in is doing day and night. When we sleep, the 
mending goes on better than when we are awake, and it 
is done so well we do not hear or think of the busy little 
workmen inside. All they ask is the right kind of food, 
not too much or too little of it, and they will take the 
right thing to the right place, and keep the house in good 
order. 

Helen: I have read of some men ''training" their 
muscles. What did they do to train them '^. 

Mother: They were very careful to take only that kind 
of food which is good for the muscles. They can not use 
wine, beer, whisky, or tobacco, for these make bad blood 
and weak muscles. Then they work all they can bear, 
but not too much. 

Percy: But Mr. Blank says it makes him strong to 
have a glass of beer or whisky. 

Amy: And Mr. Blank is such a big man he must have 
strong muscles. 



46 The House We Live In. 

Mother: To be big is not to be strong. It is well 
to have some soft cushions of fat between the muscles, 
but, as a rule, those who have much fat are not as 
strong and well as those who have less fat and more 
muscle. Whisky does not make the muscles grow, nor 
does it make any one strong. Would you like to have 
me tell you why this is so ? 

Elmer : Please do, mother. 

Mother : Do you remember when we were driving 
up that long hill yesterday how tired the horse seemed till 
he was struck with a whip.'^ After that he went much 
faster, and did not seem tired at all for a little while. The 
whip was a stim'u-lant to the horse. Whisky and beer are 
stim'u-lants, too. Mr. Blank works till his muscles are tired, 
and then, instead of giving them food and rest, he gives 
them beer, which makes him think he is stronger when he 
is really weaker. The whip made the horse forget he was 
tired, but don't you think if he had rested an hour and 
eaten some good oats and sweet hay, he would have had 
more strength than he had after he was struck with the 
whip? 

Percy : I think so ; for if we had given the horse no 
rest and had kept whipping him, after a time he could not 
work at all. 

Mother: And that is just what happens to the man 
who drinks beer. Perhaps you have seen a man stumbling 
along the sidewalk. He is first on one side and then on 
the other, and we say he is drunk. This means that the 
alcohol he has taken has poisoned his body so the muscles 



48 The House We Live In. 

will not do their work properly. The man can not make 
his servants do as he tells them ; for he has made them all 
sick, and he is sick. It is a sad sight to see any one drink 
this poison, and make himself helpless. 

Amy: I never knew b.efore that strong drink hurt the 
muscles. 

Mother: And there is another poison about as bad 
for them, and that is tobacco. If a boy wishes to grow to 
be a large, noble man, with an active mind, a clean mouth, 
sweet breath, clear eyes, and strong muscles, he will not 
touch tobacco. In some countries there is a law against 
boys using it, because it does them so much harm. To- 
bacco makes the muscles weak and unsteady. Like alcohol, 
it makes a person feel stronger when he is really weaker. 





OTHER: After your father had filled the frame- 
work of his house with bricks, can you tell me, 
Elmer, how the outside was covered? 

Elmer : The walls were covered on the outside 
with boards, and the roof with shingles. 

Mother: That would do very well for a wooden 
house, but for one that can walk, run, jump, and 
skip about, such a stiff covering would be sadly out 
of place. We sometimes smile because the snail 
carries his house around on his back ; but the house we 
live in must move itself and carry the one who lives in 
it. How are boards and shingles fastened onto common 
houses so they will stay.'^ 
Percy: With nails. 

Mother: Just think of driving nails into muscles! Yet 
you see our body-houses must have some kind of a cover- 
ing. It must be thin and strong and one that will stretch. 
Look at your hands and see if they do not have the very 
best covering that could be made. Pinch up the skin, and 
see how thin it is, and yet how well it fits every part of 
the body. 

4 (49) 



50 The House We Live In, 

Amy: And the'skin stretches, mother. See, I can bend 
my knee and elbow, and move my fingers as I please. 

Mother: Yes, it is like a close-fitting garment. What 
we call the skin is really two skins. You see I can put a 
pin through the outer skin in the palm of my hand, and I 
feel no pain, and you see no blood. 

Helen: Isn't that all the skin we have? 

Mother: No; for under this thick, outer skin is what 
is called the true skin. It has such fine blood-vessels that 
if you could see them, they would look like fine network. 
If you should prick this inner skin it would hurt, and the 
blood would flow. This shows it has nerves as well as 
blood. Under the true skin is a layer of fat. This is like 
a warm woolen garment to keep the body warm. Between 
the outer skin and the true skin there is some jelly-like 
coloring matter, which gives it color. 

Helen: Is that why some persons are very dark and 
others are light, mother.^ 

Mother: Yes; your true skin is just the same color as 
that of the negro and the Indian. The coloring matter 
under the outer skin is all that makes the difference. This 
outer covering is made of little horny scales laid one over 
another, much as a roof might be if it had ten or twelve 
layers of shingles. The outer scales keep wearing away 
all the time, and new ones take their places. You know a 
snake sheds its skin and crawls away with a new one. 
We shed our skin, too, little by little, but the scales are 
so small we can hardly see them. If you should wear 
your under-clothing several days, and then shake it in the 



Weather-boards and Roofing. 51 

sunlight, you would see little scales floating about in the 
air like dust. 

Amy: Isn't the skin thicker in some parts of the body 
than others ? 

Mother: Yes; on the palms of your hands and the 
soles of your feet it is quite thick, while on the lips and 
some other parts of the body it is very thin indeed. Have 
you noticed how the skin looks if it is scratched and then 
heals up '^. 

Elmer: Just the same as it did before. 

Mother: But if there is a deep cut or a severe burn, 
how does it look after it heals? 

Helen: There is a scar left. 

Mother : This shows that the outer skin and the color- 
ing matter will come back as they were before if they are 
hurt; but when the true skin is injured, the blood makes 
a kind of patch, which we call a scar. Another curious 
thing about the true skin is that it has tiny muscles, and 
when the body is cold, they draw up and make little hillocks, 
which we call *' goose-flesh." 

But the skin is very useful, besides being a covering for 
the body. When we were getting dinner to-day, what did 
we do with the potato parings and other things we did 
not wish to keep? 

Percy: We put them in the garbage box. 

Mother: Why did we do that? 

Amy: Because they were not fit for food. 

Mother : And what do we call that which we do not 
wish to keep, and so throw away ? 



52 The House We Live In. 

Helen: We call it waste. 

Mother: What do we do with waste matter? Do we 
let it stay in the house ? 

Elmer: No; we throw it away. 

Mother: Why would it not be best to let it remain 
in the house ? 

Percy : Because it would decay and make us ill. 
Mother : Well, it is the same way in the house we live 
in. All the food we eat can not be used, and some parts 
of the body are wearing out all the time. If the waste 
stayed inside, we should become ill. In the skin there are 
thousands and millions of little tubes called pores ^ which 
help carry away the waste. If you become very warm, 
you say you are "sweating," or per-spir'ing; that is, drops 
of water come out all over your body. They come through 
the pores, or little holes in the skin. But we sweat, or 
perspire, all the time, whether we can see it or not. If the 
pores of the skin were stopped up, a person would soon 
die. If the skin is very dirty, the sweat can not get out, 
and it stays inside. To show you how many pores there 
are, you may look at this little piece of 
paper, which is just one inch square. In 
such a space on the limbs there are five 
hundred pores. On the trunk of the body, 
forehead, back of the hand, and on the 



"<9«^ inch square:' foot, One thousaud ; and on the palm of the 
hand and sole of the foot there are tzventy-seven hundred. 
Each of these little waste-pipes is one-fifth of an inch long. 
If they were placed one after another, wise men tell us we 



Weather-boards and Roofing. 53 

would have two or three miles, and perhaps even more, of 
waste-pipes for the body. What do you suppose would 
happen if they were choked up, and all the waste should 
remain inside? 

Amy: We would become ill. 

Mother : We surely would. Sometimes we call it 
"taking cold." If we cool off too quickly when warm, 
or get our clothes wet and do not put on dry ones, or in 
a warm spring day put on thin clothes, all these things 
stop the waste-pipes, and w'e ''catch cold," have a sore 
throat, and we may have a fever, which shows that the 
waste is being burned up inside ; and the house becomes 
burning hot. 

Percy : Then the pores must be kept open all the time 
if we would be well. 

Mother : Yes ; but there is another way than those I 
have told you by which they get choked up. The waste- 
pipes leave the dirt they carry out of the body on the skin, 
for that is as far as they can carry it. The master of the 
house must see that the skin is kept clean, so the pipes 
will not be choked. 

Elmer: Then he ought to wash it often. 

Mother : I think so, and not only some parts, but the 
whole house needs a good scrubbing with soap and warm 
water as often as twice a week, and if he will then take a 
bath of some kind each day, that will keep the skin clean 
and healthy. Even rubbing the whole body once a day 
with a damp towel and then with a dry one, will keep the 
waste-pipes open, so they can do good work, if there is a 



54 



The House We Live In. 






thorough scrubbing twice a week, as I have said. We 
should also be careful to wear clean clothing next to the 

skin, for there 
is about a quart 
of waste matter 
carried through 
the pores every 
day. Can you 
think of any 
other ways in 
which the skin 
is useful besides 
being a cover- 
ing and carry- 
ing away the 
waste '^ 

Helen : It 
helps us y^^/ dif- 
ferent objects. 
Those who are 
blind learn to 
do many useful 
things by the 
sense of touch, 
things by this sense. 




-^,M'! II' I nil 



''A thorough scrubbing." 

Mother: Yes, we learn many 
You know when you show anything to a baby it stretches 
out its little hands to "feel" of the object. How do you 
think such poisons as alcohol and tobacco affect this cov- 
ering of the body ? 



Weather-boards and Roofing, 55 

Amy : They must make more waste in the body, and 
so the skin has more to do. 

Percy : I think it must fill it full of poison. 

ElxMER : Does alcohol make the skin look red, mother ? 

Mother: Yes; that is why a man who drinks beer or 
other drinks containing alcohol, has such a red face. Some- 
times his nose is called a "rum blossom." The alcohol 
makes the blood-vessels larger than they should be, and so 
his nose and face become very red. Bad food is also 
hurtful to the skin, for it can not be clear and healthy it 
the blood is not clean. Pimples and sores are caused by 
bad blood, and they show that better food is needed in 
the body. 

Amy: But you haven't told us what the roof of the 
body house is, mother. 

Mother: Have you ever seen a house with a thatched 
roof — I mean one covered with hay or straw instead of 
iron or shingles 1 • 

Elmer: Oh, yes, we saw some when we were out in 
the country! 

Mother: Well, the roof of the house we live in is 
more like that than like a shingled roof. 

Percy: Now I know what you mean: the body-house 
has a roof of hair. 

Mother : And it is a most beautiful covering, too. 
Each hair grows in a little pocket, which is furnished with 
a tiny bag of coloring matter and a bottle of hair oil. 
These give color to the hair, and keep it soft and smooth. 
If we put much oil on the hair, it causes the oil bottles in 



56 The House We Live In, 

the skin to dry up. There is no dressing so good as thiu 
which is made in the skin. We should brush and comb 
the hair carefully, to keep it shining and healthy. 

People sometimes lose this beautiful thatch, and we say 
they are ''bald-headed." In very old people it turns gray 
or white, and it is like a beautiful, silvery crown. The Bible 
says that "a hoary head is a crown of glory." Very small, 
new houses sometimes have no thatch at all, but as they 
get larger and older, one grows, and at first it is fine as 
softest silk. The Bible says that even the hairs of our 
head are all numbered or counted by our heavenly Father. 
From this we may see how much He loves and cares 
for us. 




THE CUPO LAp 




LMER: Have you seen the cupola on the new 
house in the next street, mother? 

Mother: Yes; it is very pretty. It is quite 
common now to build cupolas on large houses. But 
I was thinking, as you came in, of the cupola, or tower, on 
the house we live in. Can you think what it is ? 

Percy: It must be the head. 

Mother : That is right, but, unlike the cupola of a 
common house, which is used but little, the head is the 
best room of all, and the others would be of little worth 
without it. It is here we find the master, the one who 
gives orders to his servants, the muscles, and directs all 
they do. 

In large business houses you sometimes see a room 
having on the door the word ''Office," and you know if 
you have business there, that is the place for you to go to 
find the manager. We might call the head the office room 
of the body, for it is here the manager is always found if 
at home. 

While you know there is a master to our house, yet you 
can not see him. He may peep through the windows, you 
may hear him speak, and you can talk to him. Perhaps 
you will love him very much, or you may dislike to be near 
him. You may see his work, but still you can not see /it7n. 

(57) 



58 The House We Live In. 

Amy: You must mean that the mind is master of the 
body, is it not, mother? 

Mother: It surely ought to be; but I am sorry to say 
that in some houses the servants get the master to do as 
they Hke, and then the body-house has a bad time, for 
"whether one member suffer, all the members suffer with 
it." The apostle Paul said, '' I keep under my body, and 
bring it into subjection," and this is the work given to the 
master of every body-house. The mind should know what 
is good for the body, and, though the servants may ask 
many times to do as they like, he should firmly say, "iVi?," 
whenever they wish to do wrong. Can you tell what the 
mind is.'^ 

Helen: It is the part of me that thinks and remembers. 

Mother: And it also wills, that is, we "make up our 
mind," as we say. Why do you think our mind is in the 
head .-* 

Percy : Why, if our hands, arms, or feet were cut off, 
we could still think. 

Mother: Do you remembet' the name of the organ 
inside the head with which we think .-^ 

Amy: The brain. 

Mother: Yes; and since the brain is such an important 
part of the body, it is put in the strongest room of all. It 
sometimes becomes ill if not used right, so we should learn 
how to keep it well. The worst sickness in the world is 
mind sickness, and it is hardest to cure. 

The brain has six coverings in all. The outside cover- 
ings are the hair and scalp, or skin. Then we find the 



The Cupola, 



59 




stronor bones, fitted closely together with saw-teeth edges. 
Inside the bones the brain has three coverings: first, a 
tough, strong skin ; then a very thin covering, hardly thicker 
than a spider's web; and the third is made up of many little 
blood-vessels, which feed the brain. 

Amy : I wish we could see how the brain looks, mother. 

Percy: I have seen brains at the butcher shops. Do 
ours look like that ? 

Mother : Yes, quite the same. 
You have all seen the marrow in 
the bones. The brain looks some 
like that, too. It is made of jelly- 
like matter, and seems to be all 
crumpled up, so it is full of ridges 
and creases, as you see in this pic- 
ture. It is said a baby's brain is 
quite smooth, but the more a person thinks, the more 
ridges and furrows his brain will have and the deeper they 
are. A frog's brain is smooth, like this. 

Elmer : But I don't see how the brain thinks. 

Mother : That is one of the things we can never under- 
stand. God gave men life, and when we are alive we think. 
"In Him we live, and move, and have our being," and to 
be able to think is one of the best gifts that comes with 
life. It is the life God gives us which makes the body- 
house worth more than the most costly palace in the world. 

If we look carefully into the brain, we see that the out- 
side is gray, and the inside is white. Wise men tell us 
this matter is made of cells, called nerve cells, or brain cells. 




The brain is full of 
ridges and creases. 



6o The House We Live In. 

The gray matter tells the muscles what to do, and the 
white part sends the orders to all parts of the body through 
the nerves. 

Elmer: Have we more than one brain, mother? 

Mother: I might say no, and yes. It is really one, 
and yet it is in several parts. One is the big brain, which 
is found above the ears in the top of the head. It is with 
this part we think and reason. Then there is a little brain, 
in the back part of the head under the large brain. It is 
about as big as a medium-sized orange. Each brain haa 
two parts, a right and left hah, so we really have two 
brains. It might be said we are "left brained" when we 
are "right handed," for the right hand is ruled by the left 
half of the brain. 

Amy: How large is the brain, mother.-^ 

Mother: That of a man weighs about three pounds. 
An elephant's weighs eight or ten pounds, and that is 
the heaviest of any we know. The brain must be used, the 
same as the muscles, if we would have it do its work well. 
It makes it grow and does it good when we study and 
think. As it was made to think about something, we 
should give it good things to think about. If it is lazy, it 
will lose the power to work, just as the muscles do, and if 
used, It will grow stronger and can do still harder work. 

Helen : And does it ever need rest ? 

Mother : Certainly ; it must rest, the same as the mus- 
cles. People sometimes hurt the brain by working it very 
hard and letting the muscles do nothing. 

Percy: But how can it rest? We can't stop thinking. 



The Cupola. 6i 

Mother: No; we think of something all the time we 
are awake, so the best way to rest the brain is to take 
plenty of sleep. Sometimes a part of it keeps awake while 
the body is asleep, and then we say we had a dream. 
Another way to rest the mind is to set the muscles at 
work after we have been reading or studying. Boys and 
girls in school should spend part of each day working, or 
in some way using their muscles in the open air. 

Elmer: I should think the master of the body-house 
would want to look outside of his little room sometimes. 

Mother : Yes, he does ; and the cupola of which we 
have been talking has two wonderful windows. 

Amy: Oh, I know what they are! They are our eyes. 

Mother: Yes, and through them the master looks out 
and sees all that is passing around him. 

Helen : I should think there ought to be windows on 
all sides of his room. He can look out only one way. 

Mother: But you see this cupola is placed on top of 
a tower we call the neck, which turns easily and quickly, 
and, besides, the whole house can ''face about" in an instant, 
so he can look other ways than straight ahead, with no 
trouble. 

Percy: Why do you call the brain the master of the 
house, mother? 

Mother: Because it tells the feet, hands, tongue, eyes, 
and all other parts of the body what to do, and they obey 
it. Sometimes we find a bad master in one of these beau- 
tiful houses. He tells the feet to go to a saloon. He tells 
the tongue to ask for beer and other kinds of strong drink. 



62 The House We Live In. 

He tells the hand to lift the glass to his lips. It may be 
he knows he is taking poison into the house, which will 
make his servants, the muscles, unfit for work. Perhaps 
he knows, too, that the drink will hurt himself more than 
any other part of the body-house, for it puts him to sleep 
when he ought to be awake telling his servants what to 
do, yet he does it, and often suffers all the rest of his life 
for his folly. 

Elmer : Does alcohol hurt the brain ? 

Mother: Surely it does. It makes the blood impure, 
so it can not furnish good food for the brain. It causes 
more blood to go to the head than ought to be there. It 
makes people mad, crazy, or insane. 

Sometimes it brings that awful disease, delirium tremens, 
and then the poor master thinks his best friends are his 
enemies, that serpents and horrible creatures are crawling 
over his body, and he dies a terrible death, and goes into 
a drunkard's grave. He ruins the house God gave him to 
live in, and finds it is true that "at the last it biteth like 
a serpent, and stingeth like an adder." 

Children, never touch these poison drinks. 

' ' Never put them in your mouth, 
To steal away your brains." 



m^ mw». 



Oo 



OUR 

TELEPHONE 

SYSTEM 



lERCY: Ting-a-ling! There's the telephone 
bell. How strange it seems to talk to peo- 
ple, and hear them talk, when they are miles 
away! 

Mother: But the most wonderful tele- 
phone in the world is found in the house we 
live in. 

Helen: Why, mother, you don't mean to 
say we have wires all through our bodies, do 
you? 

Mother: Not wires, but something that 
answers the same purpose, only it is far more 
perfect. You know the brain is the master of 
the house, and there are hundreds of muscles 
waiting to do what he bids them. But the 
brain is upstairs, safe in his own strong little 
room. How can he tell the fingers how to 
work, and the feet where to walk } 

Amy: Please tell us, mother. I'm sure I 
don't know. 

Mother: Well, instead of wires we have 

(63) 



64 



The House We Live In. 



thousands of little lines called nerves, reaching from the 
brain to every part of the body. They are made of matter 
like that in the brain, and they are so close together that 
you can touch no place on your body, even with the point 
of a pin, without touching a nerve. Mes- 
sages are sent over them to the brain,, and 
back again to the muscles. With the nerves 
we feel. We call it the sense of 
touch. 

We might call the brain the 
"central office," from which mes- 
sages are sent, and where they 
come back. In the city you have seen 
many wires stretched on poles. Sometimes 
they are bound up together and covered 
over, making a cable like a big rope. You 
remember I told you there is a spinal cord 
or marrow running through your backbone. 
This is made up of many nerves, as the 
cable is made of many wires. There are 
sixty-two branch lines coiled up in. it. By 
looking at the bottom part of the picture 
of the brain you will see where this large 
cable enters the central office. Really, 
the top part of the cord is a little brain itself, with a long 
name, which we will not trouble now to learn. 

Elmer: If all the nerves come from the backbone, how 
do any get to the face? 

Mother: There are some little holes in the skull, and 




The nerves. 



Ou7'' Telephone System. G5 

through these twenty-four branch lines pass, carrying the 
nerves all over the face and head. One pair find their way 
to the nose, and they tell the master of the house how 
things smell. Another pair reach to the eyes, and tell him 
how things look. They are nerves of sight. There are 
three pairs to tell the muscles of the eye how to move. One 
pair passes to the ears, and are called nerves of hearing. 
The others are scattered all over the face, passing to the 
teeth, tongue, and throat, and even to other parts of the 
body. This picture shows the brain as the main office, the 
cord or cable in the back-bone, and how the branches extend 
to all parts of the body. Still there are thousands of smaller 
lines which can not be seen at all. 

Helen: And what sends the messages to and from the 
brain over the nerves, mother .^^ 

Mother: The power which sends them is called "nerve 
force," though what it is even the wisest men do not know. 
We can stop it by pressing on the nerves, just as you can 
stop the current of the telegraph. We sometimes say that 
our leg or arm is "asleep." If we try to move, it gives us 
pain, or it may be we can not move at all. One nerve 
runs along the back side of the arm over the elbow. If 
we hit the elbow, it makes the arm and hand feel numb. 
We say the "funny bone," or the "crazy bone," is hurt, but 
it is not the bone at all, but the nerve. 

Amy: I heard a lady who is ill say she wished she 
had no nerves. Why do we have them ? 

Mother : I think we have already learned how useful 
they are to carry messages for us. We would be quite 

3 



66 



The House We Live In. 



helpless without them, for the brain sends word over them 
every time we move any part of the body. Another reason 
is they watch for our welfare. If we are cut or burned, it 
gives us pain. We don't like the pain, so we are more 
careful when we use sharp tools or go near the fire. 

If you touch the hot stove, you jerk away your hand. 
"I'm burnt," the finger sends word to the brain. The 
brain sends back the message, *' Get off the stove, 
quick." And to the nerves of the eye it says, ''See 
f it is blistered." To the face muscles, "Make up 
a wry face to show how badly it hurts." To 
the feet and hands, "Get some cold water to put 
the burned finger in." To the tongue, "Tell 
your mother about it." All these mes« 
s are sent at the rate of one hun- 
feet a second, and the eye, face, 
hands, feet, and tongue all feel 
sorry for the burnt finger, and do 
all they can to help it. 

Every part of the body, 
the bones, muscles, stomach, 
heart, and lungs, has these 
useful little nerves to let the 
master know when anything 
is wrong with them. 

Elmer: Do the nerves 
ever get sick, mother '^ 

Mother : Oh, yes, very 
often ! Sometimes they are 




■ ' Tell vour mother about it 



Our Telephone System, 67 

so ill that no message can pass over them to the brain. Then 
we say the person is paralyzed. A lady had her limbs par- 
alyzed. She cx)uld not walk, or move her feet at all. One 
day she took a foot bath. She could not tell whether the 
water was cold or hot, and soon the nurse found the skin 
on her feet blistered, because the water was too warm. The 
nerves were dead, and she felt no pain at all. Pain is hard 
to bear, but if there were no pain, the house we live in 
would soon be ruined. It tells us when danger is near, 
and because we do not like the pain, we take care of the 
body. The nerves are more wonderful than any telephone 
or telegraph, and when you get older, you must learn all 
you can about them. 

Helen: The brain must have a lot of work looking 
after the nerves and sending so many messages over them. 
I don't see how it can think of anything else. 

Mother : Perhaps I can explain it to you. Suppose 
there is a family who have much to do. The father 
does the hardest work of all. When his wife sees how 
much he has to do, she tries to help him all she can, 
so she does many things without saying anything to her 
husband about it. They have one son, a strong, upright 
young man, and he takes part of the work, because he 
wishes to help his parents. We will call the large brain 
the father, because it does so much of our thinking. As 
you say, Helen, if he looked after all parts of the body, 
there would be but little time for study and helping other 
people. Besides, he falls asleep sometimes, so the little 
brain, which we will call his wife, takes the work that must 



68 TJie House We Live In. 

be done all the time, as good wives and mothers do, suxti 
as keeping the heart beating, the lungs breathing, and 
other parts of the body at work which can not stop to 
rest. Then there is the spinal cord, which we will call the 
son, and he takes charge of the feet and hands when they 
have common kinds of work to do. When you went to 
school this morning, I saw you reading a book while you 
walked. Your brain did not send w'ord to each muscle 
what to do every time you took a step, but you walked 
"without thinking," as we say. The spinal cord took 
charge of your feet, so we know it can do an easy kind of 
thinking. When you were learning to skate, Percy, you 
kept thinking all the time how to move your feet and what 
to do to keep from falling. But after you had learned 
how, Father Brain gave his son. Spinal Cord, charge of you, 
and he thinks of something else most of the time while 
you skate. It is the same with anything we have learned 
to do well by doing it over and over, such as playing the 
piano, riding a bicycle, and many other things we keep 
doing again and again. 

Percy: Does alcohol harm the nerves, mother.'^ 
Mother: Yes, indeed. Alcohol seems to like the 
nerves better than any other part of the body, and it does 
them more harm than any other, except the brain. When 
alcohol touches a nerve, it dries it up and makes it hard, as 
though it had been burned. It causes that dreadful disease, 
paralysis, of which I have told you. The nerves get so' 
stupid and sleepy they do not know what the brain says 
to them. They can not tell the muscles what to do, and 



Our Telephone Sy stern. 



69 



this is why a drunken man staggers. A drunkard lias 
trembling hands, because the poison has made his nerves 
sick. Sometimes those wonderful nerves of the eye and 
ear tell him lies, and he believes what they say. Some- 
times the poor nerves and brain are so nearly dead that 
the man falls down, and people say he is "dead drunk." 
Elmer: I have heard people say tobacco was good for 

the nerves, that 
it made them 
feel rested, and 
they could think 
better. 

Mother: To- 
bacco is a poi- 
son, and is as 
hurtful to the 
nerves as alco- 
hol. One who 
uses it thinks 
he is rested, but 
the reason he feels so is because the poison has put his 
nerves to sleep. Tobacco also creates an appetite for strong 
drinks. It is very bad for boys to use tobacco in any way. 
Amy : What should we do to keep the nerves well ? 
Mother: Give them good food, plenty of fresh air, and 
no poisons of any kind. They must also have rest to keep 
them strong. It helps the nerves to be happy and cheer- 
ful. The little boy in this picture is forming a bad habit, 
which will not only make him unhappy but unhealthy. 




''The little boy is forming a bad habit. 



70 The House We Live In, 

Hateful, unpleasant thoughts make poisons in the body and 
cause sickness in the brain and nerves. People sometimes 
drop dead by becoming very angry. *' A merry heart doeth 
good like a medicine." Yes, it is much better than any 
medicine men can make. Children should form the habit 
of being happy and hopeful. The brain and nerves will 
form good or bad habits, and the master of the body-house 
should use all his power to have them good instead of bad. 
Every evil habit leaves a scar on the brain. 



THMMLL':'c^R''''R^iifiE 





wmmm 



OTHER: I once read a book called ** Uncle 
Tom's Cabin," and In it a story was told of 
how a lady was once talking with a little 
negro girl named Topsy. 

"Who made you?" she asked the child. 
''Nobody, as I knows on. I sped I grow d,'' was the 
answer. 

Now we know God made the body-houses we live in, 
for ''it is He that hath made us, and not we ourselves;" 
yet in one way Topsy was right, for we all **grow'd." 
God made us grow, and it is He only that can make 
anything grow. 

Elmer: But we must have food to make us grow. 
Mother: Yes, everything that has life must have food 
of some kind. You remember I told you we had iron, 
lime, and other things to build the body-house, just as a 
man must have wood, brick, iron, and glass when he wishes 
to build. We have looked at the outside^of the house we 
live in, and we have learned some things about its frame, 
its servants, the telephone system, and the master who lives 
inside. Now we will look through some of the wonderful 
rooms in the house, and I am sure you will enjoy learning 
how they are made, and the work that is done in them. 

(71) 



J72 The House We Live hi. 

The door, or entrance, is so small we can not possibly 
go inside ourselves, so here is a slice of good whole-wheat 
bread we will send, and I will tell you what it finds within. 
As it has no tongue, I will speak the words it would say 
if it could talk, and you may ask any question you wish. 
Now listen: — 

I was made from the wheat that grew in a farmer's 
field. After the miller had ground me into flour, your 
mother made me into a loaf, and I was baked in a hot 
oven till I was brown all over outside. As she put me 
away to cool, she said, ''That will make the children grow." 
She left me alone a whole day, for she knew I was unfit to 
be eaten while so warm. After that I was cut into slices 
and made ready to help mend and build up the body-house. 

I started on my way to the kitchen, where much of 
the work is done, and to get there passed through a pair 
of front doors, which were a pretty red color. These 
doors, I have been told, can do wonderful things besides 
opening to let visitors pass in. They can sing, whistle, 
and talk. They look best when the corners turn up ; if 
they turn down, one does not care to go near them. 

Helen: Oh, I see! You mean our lips. 

Mother : Yes, I think that is what you call them. 
When I passed inside the doors, I found a double row of 
thirty-two servants, all dressed in clean white dresses, waiting 
for me. Children have only twenty-eight of these servants, 
I am told. It was their work to make me ready for the 
kitchen downstairs. If the house is very new, you will 
find only three or four, or perhaps none at all. 



74 



The House We Live In. 



Percy: The servants must be the teeth. I didn't know 
there were so many. 

Amy: And I think the bread we eat doesn't always find 
them wearing clean white dresses, either. There is Uncle 
John ; his teeth are all stained with nasty tobacco juice. 

Mother : But they should be dressed as I have said, 
and they need careful brushing and washing every day. 
They should not be used to crack nuts, for they may get 
broken. If they are not well cared for, the dresses wear 
out, and great holes can be seen in them. Sometimes they 
can be mended, and again they cause the master of the 
house much trouble, and he is obliged to get some one 
to take them away, because they give him so much pain. 

I was quite surprised at the way these servants treated 
me, though I suppose they knew best what to do. Some 
of them cut me in two. Others tore me into pieces and 
ground me till I thought I was passing through another 
mill. As I had a chance, I looked around, and then I 
saw the room I was in had a beautiful arched ceiling of a 
pale pink color. 

There was a large servant behind those dressed in white, 
and he wore a pink uniform. You should have seen the 
way he rolled me over and over in that room. The serv- 
ants in white dresses never stirred from where they were 
standing, but the one wearing the pink uniform jumped 
from one side of the room to the other, and seemed to be 
a very lively fellow. I don't know what he would have 
done had he not been fastened to the floor. Sometimes, 
I am told, he peeps out between the folding doors to see 



The Hall or Passage. 75 

what is going on outside, or to tell what kmd of work is 
being done inside. I have heard that sometimes his dress 
becomes a dirty yellow or brown, and a man with a wise 
look comes and asks this servant to step outside a moment, 
till he can see how his uniform looks. 

Helen : How funny to think of our teeth and tongue 
as our servants ! 

Mother: But that is what they are. There is another 
group of servants in this passage, called glands. They have 
little rooms opening into the passage near the floor, and 
also in the back part of the room. If you ever visited a 
cave, you remember the walls were wet, and water was 
dropping from them. You know the skin on the outside 
of your body feels dry. Some parts of the body have 
skin inside, but it is wet instead of dry. It is that way in 
this hall. That which makes it so is called saliva, and it 
is the duty of the servants called glands to pour saliva 
over the food as soon as it comes through the front doors, 
while the tongue rolls it about, and the teeth grind it. 

Elmer : But what good does that do ? 

Mother: It moistens the food and makes it slippery, 
so it can pass on to the kitchen. Perhaps you know bread 
is partly made of starch. Another thing the saliva does is 
to turn starch into sugar, and this makes less work in the 
kitchen downstairs, as the cook down there has but little 
to do with starch. 

Amy: How may we know when the starch in bread 
or biscuit is changed to sugar? 

Mother: If you let the teeth chew your food a long 



76 The House We Live hi. 

time, until It becomes well mixed with saliva, you will find 
that It tastes sweet. This Is because the starch has become 
sugar, though you must not think this kind of sugar Is as 
sweet as the sugar which you buy. 

Helen: If the walls In this room moisten the food, 
why should we drink while eating? 

Mother: It Is not best to drink much when you eat, 
and not at all unless your food Is very dry. The glands 
furnish from one to three pints of saliva a day. If you 
drink much, the saliva Is not well mixed with the food, 
and It Is hurried down to the kitchen before the servants 
have finished their work. This makes extra work for the 
cook downstairs. 




KITCHEiN 




OTHER: We will now let Bread proceed witli 
its story. Remember I am telling you what it 
would say if it could talk. Now listen. While 
I was in the passage and the servants were 
making me ready to go to the kitchen, I saw a 
small pink curtain in the back end of the room, 
and I wondered what was behind it. I soon 
_ found out. After the tongue had pulled and 
^ \v( pushed me around and rolled me over as long 
as he wished, he pushed me back toward the 
curtain, and I found myself in a room with no floor. I 
saw a passage which opens into the nose, but as soon 
as I came in sight, a curtain fell back and closed it, so I 
knew I was not wanted there. Then I saw another door, 
which I afterward learned led to the bath-room in the 
lungs, but as I was about to go in, a little trap door 
closed tightly, and so I found that was not the way to the 
kitchen. There was still another passage, for this room 
seemed to be filled with doors, even though it was so 
small, but that led to the ear. I began to think I was 
not wanted at all, for every door I came to was shut in 

my face, as it were. 

(77) 



78 



The House We Live In. 



Helen: I don't wonder Bread didn't know which 
way to go, do you, mother ? and it was a stranger in the 
house, too. 

Mother: I was just thinking about going back through 
the folding doors through which I came, when a door 
opened in the back part of the throat, and I began to sHde 
downstairs. Such queer stairs you never saw. They 

seemed to grow larger as I 
went down, and smaller at the 
top, so they kept pushing me, 
and I could not go back if I 
would. 

Percy: I suppose it was 
the same way when I swal- 
lowed a button the other day. 
I wanted it back badly enough, 
but it wouldn't come. 
Helen: That shows you should never put such things 
as pins and buttons in your mouth. 

Elmer: And what did the kitchen look like? 
Mother: Like no room you ever saw in your life. I 
looked around for the corners, but there were none. It is 
shaped some like an ^g<g. Here is a picture, which will 
help you to understand the shape of the room. 

You see it has two doors, or openings, — one at which 
to go in, and the other to pass out. The walls are a pale 
pink color and are full of wrinkles if the room is empty. 
When the master of the house sends down so much bread 
or other food that it fills the kitchen full, the walls become 




The stomach. 



Our Kitchen. 79 

smooth and the room is larger, but when the food first 
begins to go down, it finds the room quite small, and the 
walls full of folds, or wrinkles. 

This room is very strong, as there are really three walls, 
one inside the other. The pink lining inside is made of 
wet skin, something like that found in the room upstairs. 
The middle wall is made of muscles, which cross one another 
in different ways; for the kitchen has many of these useful 
servants. The outer coat, or ** overcoat," of the stomach 
has for its work to pour out a kind of water to keep the 
walls moist so they will not stick to other things which are 
packed so closely in the trunk of the body. 1 am sure no 
person could ever pack so many things in a trunk the same 
size without crowding some of them or getting them out 
of order. 

Helen: But I would like to know who acts as cook 
in this curious kitchen. 

Mother : The name of the head cook is Di-ges'tion. 
There is a whole family of helpers, named Juice, whose 
work it is to assist Di-ges'tion. Of course they do not boil 
and bake, as we do, but they take the food and make it 
ready for the use of the body. Perhaps you would call it 
di-gest'ing it. 

The chief helper is a very important person, called Gas- 
tric Juice. When the kitchen is empty, Gastric Juice stays 
in some tiny bags or bottles which cover the walls of the 
kitchen all over, but as soon as anything comes into the 
room from the stairway at the top, she comes out and goes 
to work. She pours a fluid which looks like water, ovei 



8o The House We Live In. 

the food, which dissolves, or melts it. If you could look 
inside you might think the stomach was "sweating;" but 
it is only Gastric Juice coming out to care for the food you 
have sent down to build and mend the body. Several 
quarts come from the walls of the kitchen every day. 

Were you ever in a ship at sea? If so, you know that 
everything in the boat was shaking and moving. As soon 
as Bread comes into the kitchen, it finds the room moving 
like that, and it is thrown from one side to the other, and 
churned up and down, over and over, till, if you could see 
it, you would never think it was bread at all. Gastric 
Juice melts and mixes it, and it becomes so changed it 
looks very much like paste. After Bread comes down- 
stairs, some potatoes, fruit, and other things "come tumbling 
after," but after all has been in the kitchen two hours, you 
could not tell which is bread, fruit, or potatoes ; for they 
are all mixed together. 

I expect you are wondering how the food would ever 
get out of the kitchen. After it was shaken and churned 
several hours, the walls gave it a push, and it came to the 
door where visitors pass out. Such a queer door it was, 
too, but it opens and shuts like the one at the entrance to 
the passage. This door has neither hinges nor rollers. It 
was kept tightly closed while the food was churned about 
and melted, and it looks quite like a boy's lips when he is 
going to whistle. As Bread came near, the door opened, 
and part of the food paste passed through into another 
room. Strange as it may seem to you, this door seems to 
do a kind of thinking, and if food tries to get through 



Our Kitchen. 8i 

before it is made as fine as it should be, the door seems to 
say, ''No, sir; you can not go through here;" and it shuts 
so close together that not another thing can pass out. So 
when the food came the first time, the door seemed to think 
part of it was too big to go through, and it was sent back, 
to be churned and squeezed again before it could go into 
the next room with the rest of the food. 

Elmer: I didn't know it took so much work and such 
a long time to digest what we eat. 

Mother: This should teach us to use care in what we 
send into the stomach. Let me tell you a few other things 
about the stomach, which we call the kitchen of the body. 
The helper, Gastric Juice, does her work perfectly if she is 
used well; but when the master of the house is unkind, she 
always makes him suffer for it. Sometimes he sends down 
a lot of cold water, ice-cream, or some other kind of ice, 
when she is just ready to begin her work. This makes 
her kitchen so cold that she is obliged to wait till it 
gets warm again. She doesn't like much water when she 
has work on hand ; for she thinks Saliva and herself can 
moisten the food as much as it needs. 

Amy: Does Di-ges'tion like hot drinks, mother .-^ 

Mother: No; they burn the tender walls of the stom- 
ach and make them weak. Tea and coffee are hurtful to 
the stomach, as well as to the nerves and other parts of the 
body. Another thing Di-ges'tion likes is to have all the 
food she is going to work on at once. That means we 
should eat what we need and then stop. If the master of 
the house sends down a good-sized dinner, and, after waiting 



82 The House We Live In. 

an hour or two, sends some more, the poor cook has a 
hard time, and It is no wonder that she gets sulky. It 
is as though you had been at work during the day, and 
then I should ask you to work all night, and give you no 
time to rest. 

The cook in our kitchen is willing to work hard, and then 
she wants a rest, and this she ought to have. She hates 
to work at night after working all day, but some masters 
are so unkind as to even call her up after she has gone to 
bed, thinking her day's work is done; and she works and 
works away while other parts of the body have rest. 

Helen: I suppose that is when we eat between meals 
or late at night. 

Mother: Yes; and another thing the cook dislikes is 
to have her kitchen filled so full that no more can gret in. 
She must have room to work. 

ElxMEr: That means we should not eat too much. 

Mother: That is right. We should never eat till we feel 
so full we can take no more. If a builder was beginning 
to build or mend a house and you should pile bricks, timber, 
stones, and lime around him till he had no room to work, 
he would say, " Please take part of this out of my way, 
and then I can do something." So the stomach wants just 
enough, but no more, and we should not make the cook cross 
by abusing her in this way. She also dislikes hot things, 
such as mustard, pepper, and spices. How would your eye 
feel if you should get some pepper or mustard in it? 

Elmer: It would smart. 

Percy: It would look red. 



Our Kitchen. 2>2, 

]\I other: That is the effect they have on the stomach, 
too. Neither does the cook like to have much fat or 
sugar. Sometimes she gets so provoked when the master 
of the house sends dov/n things she can not use, or too 
much even of that which is good, that the doorway to the 
stairway opens by which they came down, and she throws 
them back in his face. He has a sorry time of it then, 
and it may be quite a while before she is pleased again. 
But she only does this after she has suffered a long time, 
and when she knows it is for the good of the body-house. 

Aimy: What a long time it takes to fix up the food we 
eat so it can be used in the body ! I would like to know 
where the food goes after the cook in the kitchen has 
digested it. 

Mother: We will finish this part of the story in the 
next chapter. 





|i<5': 



-J \J^:: 



OTHER: While waiting for the door to open 
to let the food pass from the stomach kitchen, 
let me tell you that the walls of the kitchen are 
covered with hundreds of little mouths ; for you 
must remember this room is like no other that 
was ever made. These tiny mouths keep drinking 
the food which is digested, and' it is taken into the blood 
through the tiny blood-vessels which cover the stomach. 

At last comes the food which could not pass the door 
again, and this time it passes through into a long, narrow 
room, with walls quite like those of the kitchen. Some- 
times a plum pit gets into the kitchen ; the cook is unable 
to use it, and when it goes up to the door, it closes quickly, 
so it must stay where it is. Sometime after the door will 
open and let it through. 

Helen: That is the same as though you should tell 
me I should not do a thing, and then, because I teased 
or coaxed, you should let me do what you had before said 
I should not. 

Mother: Yes, that is the way^ with this door-keeper. 
But sometimes the door closes very tightly, and then there 
is trouble, for that which can not get through the second 
(84) 



The Eating Room. 85 

door must find its way back through the first. We should 
be very careful about swallowing large seeds of fruit, buttons, 
or anything that is hard and can not be digested. People 
are sometimes made very ill in this way. But now we 
will learn what is done in the second room. 

Perhaps it might be called the "serving room;" for 
it is here the food is made ready for the eating room. 
Here we find two assistant cooks. The name of one is 
Pan-cre-at'ic Juice, and the other is called Bile. Each 
one has a room of his own. Pan-cre-at^ic Juice has his 
home in a room back of the kitchen, which is called the 
pancreas. Bile lives in the largest room in the body-house, 
which is called the liver. 

The liver might be called a factory; for it has hundreds 
of little rooms in which Bile is made. It has a waiting 
room, called the gall, where Bile stays when he is not wanted. 
This tiny room is close to the liver, and from that Bile goes 
to the serving room. On the way he meets Pan-cre- 
at'ic Juice, and they go on to their work together. 

Bile, like some other servants, is hard to please, and 
he will do only one kind of work. It is the duty of these 
cooks to finish up the work that Gastric Juice has begun. 
Bile will work with hardly anything but fats, and it is his 
work to make them into such tiny drops that they can 
be used in the body. He must also furnish part of the 
fuel to keep the body warm. He sometimes gets lazy or 
angry if the master of the house gives him too much 
work, or if he sends too much fat or sugar into the serv- 
ing room. The master of the house tells his friends he is 



86 The House We Live In. 

"bilious," which means that Bile is out of temper and 
wants less hard work and more rest. 

Percy: Is Pan-cre-at'ic Juice so particular as Bile? 

Mother: No; he is much more obliging, and is willing 
to do anything that needs to be done. Together these 
helpers work over the food after it comes from the kitchen 
till it is very fine and creamy. 

Amy: Does this room look like the kitchen? 

Mother : The walls are very much the same, and they 
keep eating or sucking up the food that is wholly digested, 
much as a sponge sucks up water. A part is taken up this 
way and goes into the blood-vessels at once, but part is 
sent on to the eating room, where hundreds of little people 
are waiting for their breakfasts and dinners. 

Helen: How does the eatings room look? 

Mother: This room is very narrow and about twenty 
feet long. You must not think it is a straight room twenty 
feet long, for it is not. At one side it is fastened to a thin 
band, and -the band is gathered like a frill or ruffle, so the 
room, though it is folded over and over, never gets tangled. 
Perhaps I might say it is like a tube more than a room. 

The little folks who eat here do not sit at tables as 
you do. They are fastened to the walls, so they are 
always in the same places. Another name for this room 
is the ''small intestine." 

Elmer: I would like to see some of the little folks 
who eat there. How large are they? 

Mother: They are so very, very small you could not 
see them unless you had a strong glass to help you. They 



TJie Eating Room. 87 

stand up straight, like the soft, silky part of velvet or 
plush. They are called Villi. 

As the food comes in from the serving room, another 
helper, called In-tes'ti-nal Juice, takes any part which the 
other servants have not finished as it passed through their 
rooms, and thus digestion is complete. The Villi soak the 
food up as it passes them, as a plant draws water and food 
from the ground. 

Helen: But how does it all get into the blood? 

Mother: I was just about to tell you that part of the 
story. You have seen little creeks, and you know they 
flow into larger ones, which form small rivers, and they, 
in turn, flow in some broad river toward the sea. So this 
creamy fluid which is sucked up by the Villi goes into tiny 
veins; these open into larger ones, till all flow in one 
stream about as big as a slate-pencil up to a large vein 
near the neck, and from there to the heart, where the 
stream is changed to blood, and is ready for use in the 
body. Part of the food takes another way to get to the 
heart. It goes first to the liver, which takes the part it 
needs, and the rest goes on to the heart. 

Helen : Then all we eat finally gets into the blood. 

Mother: No; there is always some part that can not 
be used. Passing through the eating room the waste is 
carried into a garbage box, called the colon, which should 
be emptied every day. 

Now let us see if we can give the names of the differ- 
ent rooms a slice of bread passes through before it reaches 
the heart and becomes blood. 



88 The House We Live In. 

Elmer: First, the passage, which is the mouth, down 
the steep stairs or gullet, through the stomach kitchen, 
through the serving room, the eating room, or small intes- 
tine, and from there straight to the heart, or else by another 
road through the liver to the same place. 

Mother : Very good. Now what juices make the bread 
ready to become blood. 

Percy: First, the saliva in the mouth. 

Amy: And gastric juice in the stomach. 

Helen: Then bile from the liver, and pan-cre-at'ic 
juice from the pancreas. 

Elmer: The last was the in-tes'tin-al juice. 

Mother: That is right, and let me tell you that in 
our bodies about twenty pounds of juices are made every 
day. Now I think we can remember that the food passes 
through five rooms, and it takes five juices to make it into 
blood. Two of the juice family, which have the long 
names, in-tes'tin-al and pan-cre-at'ic, are willing to work 
on all parts of the food. The others work chiefly on one 
part only. Saliva digests starch. Bile works on fats. 
Gastric juice takes the part which is called al-bu'men. 

"Behind the bread, the snowy flour; 

Behind the flour, the mill; 
Behind the mill, the growing- wheat 

Nods on the breezy hill; 
Over the wheat is the glowing sun, 

Ripening the heart of the grain; 
Above the sun is the gracious God, 

Sending the sunlight and the rain." 




rOOD AND FUEL 




OTHER: See that engine. Can you tell me 
what gives it the power or strength to draw 
its heavy load ? 

Helen: Steam gives it power. 
Mother: And what makes the steam? 
Elmer: The fire in the furnace makes the 
water boil, and steam comes from the boiling water. 

Mother: Then the engine can do nothing unless it 
has fuel to burn and water to boil. It might be the best 
ever made, and yet do no work and have no power even 
to move itself. Do you suppose the engineer is careful to 
take plenty of the best fuel he can get, and to have a 
good supply of water, when he has a long journey and 
a heavy train ? 

Percy : I am sure he would be. I have read that it 
is counted one of the worst things an engineer can do to 
let his boiler get dry. 

Mother: Well, in some ways our bodies are like the 
engine. Can you guess what the fuel is we must have.'* 
Amy: Oh, I know! It is the food we eat. 
Elmer: And we must have water to drink, too. 

(89) 



90 



The House We Live In. 



Mother: Yes; but what would you think of an engine 
driver who would fill the furnace of his engine with stones 
or sand, and fill the boiler with beer or whisky ? 

Percy: I think he wouldn't have much steam, and his 
engine would soon be ruined. 

Mother: Then what shall we say about food and drink 
for the b.ody, which is a hundred times more perfect in all 
its parts than the best engine men ever built, and so is 
much more apt to be injured? 

Helen: We ought to give it the very 
best food and drink we can get. 

Mother: I think so, too. You know an 
engine works several hours, and is then sent 
to an engine house to be made ready for 
another trip, and, while it is running, the 
driver steps out at every station, almost, 
with his oil-can in one hand and something 
to clean with in the other, and he keeps 
cleaning it, oiling it, feeding it, and let- 
ting it drink till he comes to the end 
of his journey. Can you think how the 
body is different from this ? 

Elmer: When the body-machine 
starts running in the journey of life, 
it never stops to rest till it is worn 
out and can work no more. 

Mother : Yes, and we must 
remember that some parts work 
night and day, summer and winter, 




Food mid Fuel. 



91 



as long as we live. Yet they are wearing out all the time, 
and must be fed and cleaned and cared for while they are 
working. There are some railroads made with tanks or 
ditches between the rails, and the engine takes water with- 
out stopping. So our bodies must take food, drink, and all 
they need without stopping the living machinery. 
It is true some parts must rest every day; but fl 
others never stop working till we die. We 
should study, then, to know 
what we ought to eat and drink 
to make up the waste and keep 
the body well. Some kinds of 
birds and animals live on flesh. 
Others eat only grass and grains. 
The squirrel and the monkey eat 
nuts and fruits. Can you tell 
me some of the different things that men use as food ? 

Amy: They eat flesh, grains, and fruits. 

Elmer: And we eat other things, such as salt, sugar, 
and milk. 

Mother: Yes, while people can eat all these things, yet 
all of them are not the very best food, and, like the careful 
engineer, we should learn just what is good for the human 
machine, and give it only the best of what it can use. 
What do you think was given to men to eat at first ? 

Amy: Where can we find out, mother? 

Mother: In the first chapter of the Bible. Perhaps 
Helen will read it for us. 

Helen: **And God said, Behold, I have given you 




92 The House We Live In. 

every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the 
earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree 
yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat." 

Mother: The word "meat" means food. This was 
spoken before God had cursed the earth on account of sin, 
and so everything that grew was "good," as He had said. 
We see from this that all kinds of plants bearing seed, and 
all kinds of fruit, were good for food. No doubt if God 
had thought meat was good for man, He would have had 
a butcher shop somewhere in the garden of Eden, and 
some beef or mutton hanging from the limb of a tree. 

Percy : But what made the people begin to eat flesh, 
mother .'^ 

Mother: After a time the flood came and destroyed 
everything on the earth except what Noah had in the ark 
with him, and when he came out of the ark, God told him 
that people might eat the flesh of animals, and they have 
kept on eating it ti 1 the present time. 

Elmer: But is it the best food, mother.'^ 

Mother: No, we can not say it is the very best; for, 
as time has passed, the animals have become sickly, and 
many wise doctors say it is unsafe to eat their flesh. Cattle 
which have been killed to eat have been found with dis- 
eased lungs, livers and kidneys. People sometimes become 
very ill and many have died from eating their flesh. 

Helen: I should think if they choose such food it 
would be like the engine driver filling his furnace with 
poor coal when he could get plenty that was better. 

Mother : Perhaps so. When we can get good vege- 



Food and Fuel. 



93 



tables, grains, and fruits, it is much safer to use them for 
fuel in the body than to run the risk of giving it anything 
which might put the delicate machine out of order. 

I saw a poem not long ago, written by Dr. J. H. Kellogg, 
which you might like to have read to you. It is called 



A VEGETARIAN SONG. 

"You may talk of mutton-chop, 
You may say it is tip-top 
For a man who wants to Hve both well and long; 
But you're much behind the time, 
As ril show you in this rhyme; 
For there's better food than flesh to make one 
well and strong. 

"Chorus — 

' ' On the glorious trees ! on the glorious trees ! 
There the fruits and nuts, the fruits and nuts do 
e\^er grow. 
This is heaven's own food, 
God pronounced it very good ; 
Yes, upon the trees, kissed by the breeze, the 
best foods grow. 





"There are pippins rich and rare, 
There are plums and peaches fair, 
There are huckleberries, raspberries, and pears so sweet ; 
There are grapes upon the vine, 
Never made for use as wine. 
All of which with one accord invite us, 
* Come and eat.' 




94 



The House We Live In. 





"There's the orange and the Hme, 
Lemons, too, for summer-time, 
Which so often do refresh us in the toil and heat : 
There are nectarines so bright. 
There are cherries, red and white, .. 

All of which with one accord invite 
us, ' Come and eat. ' 







"There are English walnuts rich, 
And delicious almonds, which 
All alone supply us cream and milk, how rich a treat ! 
There are coconuts and pine, _^^ 

Pecans, hickory-nuts so fine, ^ ^^^%^^ 

All of which with one accord invite f^ ^^-^^-^-^^^~ *i 

us, 'Come and eat.' 



"There's the ox, an honest beast, 
See him served up at a feast. 
Notwithstanding he has been a faithful, true helpmeet 
To the farmer in his task ; 
Yet he never once has asked 
More than humblest fare, and now his blood cries, * Do 
not eat.' 




"There's that scavenger, the pig. 

Grown to be so fat and big 
That he scarce can stand or walk upon his clumsy feet ; 

Though he lives a life of ease. 

He is full of dire disease. 
And he surely is of all things most unfit to eat. 



V, 



r-^-^^-N^ "There's the sheep with fleece so warm, 

^vl :'7 ■ \ Never did a bit of harm. 



^Pi\AMi^v/lk ^"^ ^°^ ^^^^^ ^^^^" provides good clothing, warm and neat 
1 W Kill-. » Ere you raise the sharpened knife, 

Cut his throat, and take his life, 
Listen to his sad though mute appeal, 'Don't slay to eat.' 



Food and Fuel, 



95 




<^4:? 



"There's the oyster in his bed, 

Eating everything that's dead; 
He's the scavenger that cleans the bottom of the sea 

He lives in the mud and slime, 

Catching microbes all the time. 
And his occupation surely says, *Oh, don't eat me!' 






■1\ 



^^f 



"There are turkeys, daily fed 

On the best of household bread, 
So that they' 11 be fat and toothsome for Thanksgiving day ; 

What a sin it is and shame, 

Crime without a proper name, 
For a man these gentle creatures first to feed, then slay! 




"There are birds that sing a lay 

Full of joy at break of day, 
That will silent be forever at the set of sun. 

Some will slay the songsters sweet 

On pretense that they would eat. 
While a thousand more admit they kill them just for fun. 




"List and hear these creatures all, 

Mighty beasts as well as small, 
With a thousand, thousand voices, loud and long repeat. 

We beseech you, let us live; 

Take not life you can not give; 
Only kill ferocious creatures; never slay to eat.' 

"It was God's appointed plan, 
Given long ago to man, 
That no creature of another creature's flesh should eat, 
But that all alike should dine 
On the fruit of tree and vine 
And the toothsome grains, which heaven has given man 
for meat. 



96 



The House We Live In. 





"Better far it is to be 

A vegetarian, don't you see? 
As thus we take our daily food direct from heaven's own hand. 

When we eat another's flesh, 

We're not taking- food that's fresh, 
But are Hving on a diet that is second hand. 

' ' Oh, then, let us all resolve 

That, while earth and years revolve. 
We will never more pollute our mouths with bloody meat, 

But will choose a diet pure, 

From disease and germs secure. 
And of fruits and nuts and grains so wholesome ever eat ! ' ' 



Helen: I'm glad you read it to us, mother. It does 
seem, when the cattle eat the grass and grain, and then 
we eat them, as though we w^ere eating second-hand food. 

Percy: I don't propose to do that way any longer. I 
think I should have what I eat first-hand, as well as the 
sheep and ox. 

Mother: I am sure if you carry out your resolve you 
will have pure blood and a more healthy body. I saw 
some pictures of children not long ago who had never 
tasted meat in their lives, and they were as happy and 
hearty as you could wish to see. I want you each to act 
for yourselves in this matter, and do what you think will 
be the best for your health. 

Elmer: Is salt a food, mother.'* 

Mother: No; salt is a mineral, yet it is found in all 
parts of the body. It is also found in nearly all our foods. 
We add it to some things when cooking to give them 
flavor, but it is hurtful to eat much of it. 



Food and Fuel. 97 

Amy : Are mustard, pepper, spices, ginger, and hot 
sauces good to eat? 

Mother: No; some people think they taste good, but 
they are bad for the body. If you put some mustard on 
your skin, it makes it red, and may cause a blister. You 
know a very little pepper in your eye makes it smart. 
These hot things in the kitchen of our body-house make 
the walls red, and the cooks get very cross. When people 
eat such things, they become thirsty, and sometimes, instead 
of drinking water to cool the heated walls and put out the 
fire these hot things have made, they pour down beer, 
whisky, and other drinks, which makes the mischief worse. 
When once the habit is formed of using such things, they 
keep wanting them hotter and stronger, till nothing tastes 
good unless it is highly seasoned. Many become ill, and 
this is one way drunkards are made. 

Helen: But how do they make drunkards, mother.-^ 

Mother: These hot things which people sometimes 
put in the stomach make them thirsty, as I have said, and 
so they think they must have beer or something stronger. 
Such drinks do not quench thirst, and so they keep on 
drinking more and more. If you want the walls of your 
body-kitchen to be a pretty pale pink color, you will keep 
the doors shut tight against mustard, spices, pepper, and 
all hot sauces. You can teach your taste to like the fine 
flavors which are in our foods already, and which do no 
harm to the body. 

Amy : But sugar is a good food, isn't It, mother ? 

Mother: I thought my little girl who is so fond of 
7 



98 The House We Live In. 

sweet things would ask this question. It is true sugar is 
a food, but to use much of the kind we buy is hurtful to 
the body. Nearly all the foods we eat, such as flour, oat- 
meal, pease, beets, and milk, have sugar in them. Some 
fruits, such as figs and grapes, have a large amount. It is 
not well to eat food made very sweet with sugar, such as 
rich cakes, jams, and preserves. It is also harmful to eat 
candies and lollies, for many are made from a poor kind 
of sugar, and the coloring matter used to make them look 
pretty is hurtful. Besides, as the body-house has a sugar 
factory of its own, you see it gets too much sugar when 
we eat many sweet things. 

Helen: But where is the sugar factory, mother.'^ 

Mother: The liver, the largest worker in the house we 
live in, makes a kind of sugar, as well as the bitter bile. 
How it is done I can not tell, but it is true that in the 
hundreds of little rooms of which the liver is made, all the 
sweet things we eat are changed to liver sugar before they 
can be used in the body. The liver, also, makes starch 
into sugar, I mean the starch found in bread, potatoes, and 
other foods. Now if the fireman on an engine should 
shovel so much coal into his furnace that it was filled full, 
what would happen ? 

Elmer: The furnace would be choked up so the fire 
would go out, or else it would burn very slowly. 

Mother : That is just what takes place in this wonder- 
ful sugar factory. Since the liver makes sugar out of 
starch which is found in our foods, if we swallow a big 
piece of cake, a lot of jam, some syrup, and some candy, 



Food and Fuel. 



99 



such treatment makes the liver cross. When all those little, 
living kettles are full of sugar already, how can they hold 
any more? 

Percy: How does the liver show it is cross, mother? 
Mother: It goes to work to punish the master of the 

house. It gives 
him a nasty taste in 
his mouth, and he 
feels so sick that 
he thinks he wants 
nothing to eat. 
Perhaps the liver 
sends word to the 
stomach that it 
has "struck work," 
and it will have 
nothing to do 
with such messes 
as are sent it to 
work over. Then 
the stomach, not 
knowing what 
else to do, sends 
all there is in it 
back upstairs out 
through the passage, and the master of the house tells his 
friends who come to visit him, that he is "bilious," or that 
he has a "bilious attack," and you may be sure he has a 
sorry time. There may be a dreadful aching up in the 




'■'■He has a sorry time.** 



UdfC. 



loo The House We Live In. 

cupola; perhaps there is pain all over the house, all because 
the right kind of food and the right amount were not sent 
in to build up the body. The same thing is likely to 
happen if the master of the house sends a lot of pastry, 
fat meat, and fried or greasy foods into the kitchen. Bile 
is the one to care for them all, and he will bear such 
treatment awhile without complaining; but when once his 
temper is up, he will not be kind to anything the master 
may send him. Like other good servants, he makes a bad 
master. Perhaps he will try to do some work in a lazy 
sort of way; but he keeps grumbling all the time, till he 
makes the other servants as cross as himself 

Percy: I think I will try to keep Bile good-natured, 
and send the right things and the right amount down to 
the sugar factory. 

Mother : You may be sure you will not be happy 
unless you do; for, though strange, yet 'tis true that when 
things go wrong in the stomach and liver, it makes the 
master of the house very cross and unhappy. 

Not long ago I visited a lady who has a pleasant home 
and all she could wish to make her comfortable. I found 
her face gloomy, and she was crying. She said she was 
not well; that a skin disease was troubling her; that her 
children did not do right; and that she was very miserable. 

"I think it is my liver," she added; "for when my 
blood is right and my liver works well I am not troubled 
this way." 

Poor woman! She thought she was not a Christian, 
and she made herself and her friends unhappy by her 



Food and Fuel. loi 

fault-finding. Her liver was to blame, or rather she was 
to blame for giving it so much work to do that it made 
her life hard, when it ought to have been most pleasant. 

Helen: But, mother, you make us feel as though we 
hardly ought to eat at all, for fear of making somebody 
sour down-stairs. 

Mother: Oh, no; I don't want you to feel that way, 
but I wish you to use these servants in your body-house 
so well that it will be a pleasure to them to serve you! 
We should eat plenty of good, plain food at proper times. 
We are made so we will get hungry and want to eat; and 
it is well that we do, or we might forget that fuel is needed 
in the body. Not only should we eat proper kinds of 
food, but we should be careful not to eat too much. You 
remember that Di-ges'tion must have plenty of room in 
which to do her work, or she gets peevish and does her 
task poorly. 

Amy: How much should we eat in order not to eat 
too much ? 

Mother : Some persons need more food than others, 
and no one can tell another just how much he should eat ; 
but it is safe to say that we should not put into the stomach 
all it will hold, nor eat just for the pleasure of eating. In 
very cold countries people can eat more without harm to 
themselves than they can in warmer climates. I once read 
of a traveler in the frozen north who saw an Esquimau eat 
thirty-five pounds of meat and several tallow candles in one 
day; but such a story seems almost too big to be true, and 
we would certainly hardly feel able to take such an amount 



I02 



The House We Live In. 



of food in the same time. Children should have plenty of 
good, simple food while they are growing. 

Elmer : I think I will take a little food at a time, and 
take it often. That's the way the fireman feeds his engine. 
Mother: That may do for an engine, but not for a 
stomach. It must have rest as well as food. We should 
eat what we need, give the stomach time to digest it, let it 
rest after it has finished its work, and then give it more to 
do. One great cause of illness among people now is that 
they eat too often and too much. Three meals a day at 
regular times are enough, and the last should be a light 
one and taken early, to allow the cooks time to do their 
work before the master goes to bed. Then all will be 
quiet in the body-house, and the servants can rest after 
their toil. If treated in this way, the morning will find 
them fresh and ready for their duties. 

Helen: Should our food be cooked or eaten raw? 

Mother : I am glad you asked that question. Most 

kinds of foods are better cooked, but many things are made 

unfit for food at all by being badly cooked. To be able to 

prepare healthful food in a neat, tasteful way is the best and 

most useful knowledge a 
girl can obtain. Every 
one should know how to 
make good, light bread, 
how to prepare vege- 
tables, cook grains and 
fruits, and lay the table 
in a neat, pleasing way 

•'/,a,v the table in a neat, flea^ing ivay '" 




Food and Fuel. 

Amy: Will you teach us how, mother? 

Mother: Certainly; we will begin this very 
day. I think we will form a class of four; for 
the boys will wish to learn too. I am sure you 
will soon be able to prepare food very nicely. 

Elmer: Then we shall not always need to 
have a cook when we go out camping, but we can 
do our own cooking and care for ourselves. 

Mother: There is still one other thing that I 
wish you never to forget, and that is that many 
men become drunkards because they do not have 
the right kind of food. It may be it is made so 
hot with pepper, mustard, and spices that it creates 
thirst, or it may be but half cooked, so they feel 
poorly fed. Such men are much more apt to go 
to the bar-room than the man who sits at a neatly- 
spread table furnished with plain, healthful food. 

Percy: But isn't alcohol a kind of food, mother.'^ 
I have seen drinking men who looked so fat and 
strong it seems as if it must build up the body. 

Mother: No, my son, it is a great mistake to 
think there is any food in alcohol or in any drink 
that contains it. A noted doctor in England says 
this about it: ''There is more nourishment in the 
flour that can be put on the point of a table knife 




than in eight quarts ff^'^'^ 
of the best beer." s^ '^/^^-^V^ 



,sO' 



3_ 








.^& 




I04 



The House We Live In. 



Elmer . But why do people who drink beer look so 
fat, then? 

Mother: It is true many who drink it increase in flesh, 
and so they think the beer makes them large and strong. 
Fat men are not always strong men. The alcohol in the 
beer changes the muscles of the body into 
fat. It pushes the skin out and makes the 
face look round and plump. 
Amy: And red, too. 

Mother: Yes; and all the time the man 
is growing weaker instead of stronger. His 
liver changes into a mass of fat, and it crowds 
other rooms of the body-house so they can 
not properly carry on their work. The fleshy 
body of the beer-drinker is a diseased body, 
and you will find that it does not have firm 
muscles, a strong heart, or a healthy liver. 

Percy: But you have not told us what 
we should drink, mother. 

Mother: Water, pure water, is the best 
drink for every one. Sometimes people be- 
come very ill from drinking bad water, so care should be 
taken to have it clean and pure. Bad water may be made 
harmless by boiling it, and this should always be done if 
it is not known that it is harmless. It may look all right, 
and yet cause sickness and death. 

The well should never be near a pig-sty, barn-yard, or 
other filthy place. The seeds of sickness, which the doctors 
call "germs," may tra\'el through the ground a longdistance 




"People who drink 
beer look fat. ' ' 



Food and Fuel. 



\o 



and so get into the water in the well. This is more likely 
to be the case if the ground is sandy or slopes toward 
the well. 

Elmer: Wouldn't it be better to 
drink tea or coffee than bad water? 

Mother: Tea and coffee are not 
foods, and both contain poisons which 
are hurtful to the body. It does not 
make bad water better to put poison 
into it. Besides, these drinks are often 
taken with food, and we have found 
that the cook down-stairs can do noth- 
ing while a lot of liquid is pouring 
down over her. It is also true that 
hot drinks weaken the walls of the 
stomach. It is better to drink pure 
water, and to take it before eating or 
some time after, and then we shall not 
be tempted to swallow our food without 
properly chewing it. Alcohol, tea, and coffee are stimulants. 

Helen: And I think you said once, mother, that a 
stimulant is like a whip to a tired horse. 

Mother: Yes; to stimulate means to prick, or goad, to 
excite, or rouse to action. When a horse is very tired from 
climbing a steep hill his driver strikes him with a whip. 
That stimulates but it does not strengthen him. At first 
it takes but one blow to make him go faster, then two or 
three, and he finally becomes so weak that he does not 
respond to the whip at all. 




Water, pure water, is the 
best drink for every one.''' 



io6 



TJie House //V Live In. 



That is just what happens when a person uses tea, 
coffee, tobacco, beer, or whisky. At first only a little will 
make him feel rested and as though he were stronger. 
But soon he wants more, and does not feel as strong as 
before he took the stimulant the first time. These drinks 




stimulate, but do not give strength. When a horse is tired 
he does not need a whip, but food and rest. The same is 
true of a man or woman when tired. Instead of putting 
poison in the stomach they need good food and rest, and 
these will make them really stronger. 

Percy: I am glad that I know why all those things 
are called stimulants. 

Mother: And I must tell you one more thing about 
the liver which will help you understand what a wonderful 
part of the body-house it is, and why we should treat it 



Food and Fuel. 107 

kindly. As you already know, it is the largest room in the 
body. We might call it the store-room ; for after the fuel 
is ready to use, it is stored up in the liver, where it is kept 
till needed, just as the tender carries a supply of coal for 
the engine. 

We can not always be eating, and the body needs fuel 
when we are asleep as well as when we are awake, so the 
liver stores it away and sends it out when needed. Now 
if the master of the house sends a lot of alcohol to his 
liver, at first the little rooms fill up with fat, so they can 
not do their work or store up food for the body. If he 
keeps sending more and more whisky to his liver, it finally 
becomes small and hard, and when he goes to the doctor 
to find out what disease he has, the wise man tells him he 
has "the drunkard's liver." 

Helen: What a pity it is that men should abuse the 
liver so ! 

Mother: Yes, it is a pity, but some women are as bad, 
though not as many of them as of the men take alcohol. 
Some of them who would never think of doing that, think 
that their liver is too big, and that it makes the waist too 
large, so they gird it up with tight clothing and do not 
give it room to work. One doctor found a woman who 
had squeezed her waist so long that the liver was cut in 
two; and she died for her folly. 

When Liver finds his room growing smaller, he gets 
cross, and says, ''We'll see about this;" and he gives the 
young lady a pain in her side. Her skin begins to look 
yellow and dirty, and the silly girl goes to the doctor for 



io8 The House We Live hi. 

some medicine to make her well, when all she needs is to 
give Liver room to do his work, and give her body the 
right kind of fuel. Perhaps she is so foolish that she would 
rather be ill than let her waist grow as large as God made 
it; and, if so, she and her friends have a sorry time. 

Amy: My liver shall never scold because it can't have 
room enough in which to work. 

Mother: That's like my sensible girl, and I wish every 
other in the land would say the same. 

Helen: But, mother, I have heard girls say that their 
dresses were not a bit tight, when I am almost sure they 
were. 

Motpier: The only safe way is not to wear corsets or 
tight bands at all, and the clothing should be so loose that 
it will not compress the body when one draws a deep, full 
breath. 

Percy: I should think there was enough sickness in the 
world without people eating, drinking, and dressing to make 
themselves ill. 

Mother: Many people do not know that it is what 
they do that makes them ill. They think people must be 
sick sometimes, and they do not study to know how to 
care for themselves in such a way that they may keep well. 
For this reason I wish you to learn how to care for the 
holy temple of your body while you are children, and we 
must also do all we can to help others by living rigfht 
ourselves. 





OTHER: When we visited the water-works 
S fl what did you admire most of all the things 
I ^ you saw, Elmer ? 

Elmer : The great engines that kept pump- 
ing all the time and never stopped to rest. 
.^o-«c. T°<^1 How strange it seemed to think that they 
'^"^'^•'•^'•°-^-*^- pump enough water for all the people in this 
great city! The houses on the hillsides as well as those on 
low ground have all they need. 

Mother : But you would hardly think the house we 
live in has the most wondrous little pumping engine you 
ever saw, would you? Day and night it pumps "the river 
of life," as the blood has been called, to every part of the 
body. If it should once stop, we would die, and the body- 
house could never be used again. 

Helen: Do you mean the heart, mother.^ 
Mother : Yes. Can you tell me where your heart is ? 
Amy: I can. It is on my left side. 
Mother: Not quite right, little girl. The lower point 
Is felt on the left side, it is true; but most of the heart is 
higher up and nearer the center of your body. Who can 

tell how large it is.'* 

(109) 



no 



The House We Live In. 



Percy: About the size of the fist of the person in 
whom it is found. 

Amy: Then the baby's heart is about as big as his dear 
Httle hand. 

Mother: Can you describe its shape? 
Helen: I think it is something like that of a pear or 
a strawberry, with the small end down. 

Mother: Here is a picture that will help us in learn- 
ing its shape. 1 think I have not yet told you that the 
trunk of the body is divided into two 
large rooms. There is a partition run- 
ning crosswise, called the di'a-phragm 
(di'a-fram). .This gives us a large up- 
per room, where we find the engine and 
bath room. The kitchen, eating room, 
store room, and waste rooms are in the 
lower part of the trunk, below the di'a- 
phragm. But we want to talk about the 
heart now. We have found about how 




Ihe heart. 



large it is and what it is shaped like ; let us next take a 
peep inside and learn, if we can, how it does its work. 

Elmer: Didn't you tell us once that the heart was 
made of muscles? 

Mother : Yes ; the outside walls are made of little 
strong muscles, and the inside is hollow. It is divided into 
four rooms. Each has its own name, but we will not try 
to learn them now. There is a wall reaching from top to 
bottom, and as it has no door, nothing can pass through 
from one side to the other. Then there are cross walls, or 



A I^iif)iping Engine. 1 1 1 

partitions, with folding doors in them, so there is an up-stairs 
and down-stairs room on each side. There are big pipes, 
or tubes, leading in or out from each room. They are 
called veins, or ar'ter-ies. The veins carry the blood to 
the heart, while the arteries carry it away. 

Helen: But, mother, what makes the heart beat? 

Mother: I thought that would be about the first thing 
you would wish to know, and I will explain the best I can. 
When the muscles which make up the heart draw together, the 
rooms inside become small, and the blood in them is squeezed 
out. When the muscles slacken, the rooms become larger, 
and the blood rushes in and fills them again. So the blood 
keeps coming in and going out of the heart all the time, 
and it causes it to make the movement which we call beating. 

Amy: How fast does it beat? 

Mother: In very little children it beats from one hun- 
dred and twenty to one hundred and forty times a minute. 
In grown people it beats sixty or seventy times, and when 
the body-house has grown old and feeble, it beats slower 
still. Percy, you may run up and down stairs and then tell 
us if you see any difference in your heart-beats. 

Percy: I believe they are twice as many as they were 
when I was sitting still. 

Mother: Hardly as many as that, but the heart beats 
much more quickly. Can you think of anything else that 
makes the action of the heart faster? 

Helen: When I was frightened this morning I could 
hear my heart go thump, thump, and I am sure it seemed 
to be in a hurry. 



112 The House We Live In. 

Mother : Yes ; moving quickly, fright, anger, or joy 
makes this busy pump work more quickly. Sadness and 
grief cause it to work slowly. It beats faster when we 
are standing than when we sit still, and the motion is slower 
when we He down than when we are sitting. 

Elmer : Why did the doctor put his finger on my wrist 
when I was sick, mother? 

Mother : He wanted to know how your heart was 
working, so he felt your pulse. Sometimes when people 
are ill it beats very, very fast, and sometimes it moves 
more slowly than it should. 

Amy : What is the pulse } 

Mother: If I use any words that you do not under- 
stand you must ask what they mean. The pulse is the beat- 
ing or throbbing of the arteries caused by the blood flowing 
through them from the heart. Have* you noticed how the 
water sometimes goes in jerks as it is pumped through the 
hose pipe in the gard-en ? It is that way with the heart. 
Each beat sends the blood through the arteries in jerks, 
and when we place our fingers on them, we can tell how 
fast the heart is beating. That is called the pulse. 

Amy : Sometimes I think that I can hear my heart 
beating. 

Mother: Each time it beats it makes two sounds, and 
they can be heard if the ear is placed over the heart. The 
doctor can tell by these sounds whether the heart is working 
all right. 

Percy: But I should think it would get tired out if it 
keeps at work all the time. 




A Pumping Engine. 1 1 3 

MoTiiFj^: So it would if it had no rest. I^^vcry part 
of the body must rest. Between the heart-beats there is 
just a Httle rest, and, though the time is very short, yet if it 
were all put together it would amount to six or eight hours 
a day. . 

Helen: If the heart beats sixty or seventy times a 
minute, I wonder how many times it beats in a day. 

Mother : You may do a little figuring to 
find out. Seventy beats a minute, sixty minutes 
an hour, and twenty-four hours a day. 

Elmer: I have it. It would be more than 
one hundred thousand. 

Mother: And this means hard work, too; 
for if all it does in twenty-four hours were done 
at once, it would be equal to lifting one hundred and twenty 
tons of stone one foot from the ground. 

Percy: Whew! I should think this was a powerful 
little force-pump, sure. 

Mother : But what would you think of a man who 
made his heart beat six thousand times more in twenty-four 
hours, which means that it must lift seven tons more than 
it should.'* 

Amy: But I thought the heart kept working of itself. 
Then how could any one make it do more ? 

Mother: By taking only two ounces of alcohol in a 

day the heart would be overworked as I have said. It 

would not only have its regular work to do, but it would do 

that amount extra to throw out the poison it finds in the 

blood; for it knows it is an enemy. See, I have taken 
8 



114 The House We Live In. 

the pendulum off the clock for a minute. Now what has 
happened ? 

Elmer: It ticks much faster, and will soon run down. 

Mother: It is much the same way with the heart of a 
person who takes drink with alcohol in it. His heart beats 
faster; his face gets red, and he can think and talk fast. It 
is like an engineer putting on steam and sending his train 
at lightning speed down a steep grade. If nothing worse 
happens, he will find when he comes where the track is up- 
grade that his power is gone and he has wasted his steam. 
The clock runs fast with the pendulum off, but it soon 
"runs down," we say, and it is the same with the boy or 
the man who drinks. There are nerves which act on the 
heart as brakes do on the train. They keep it steadily at 
work and do not let it beat too fast. There is another way 
that alcohol hurts the heart. 

Helen: Please tell us how. 

Mother: It changes the strong muscle walls into fat. 
The heart grows larger than it should be, and becomes so 
weak that it can not send the blood over the body as it 
should. The man has hard work to breathe. He gets 
the dropsy and other ailments, and perhaps dies of "heart 
failure." 

Percy: Does tobacco affect the heart, mother.'^ 

Mother: Yes; it makes its beat unsteady, and some- 
times causes an illness which doctors call "tobacco heart." 
It also makes it work harder than it ought. 

Amv : What can we do to keep the heart well and 
strong? 




YOU ''CAN RUN, JUMP, AND SWING. 



Ii6 The House We Live In. 

Mother : Be sure to give It good blood to send over 
the body. You need not keep still for fear that you will 
break this curious little pump ; for, like the engines in ships, 
it Is made to be tumbled about. Boys and girls can run, 
jump, and swing, yet the little engine keeps on with its 
steady hub tub against the walls of the house, and we would 
hardly know it was there. Good, honest labor makes the 
heart work better, and sends the blood running swiftly to 
every part of the body. We say when we are cold that a 
brisk walk will "start the blood;" that is, the heart beats 
more quickly, and soon the whole body becomes warm. 
We might say that the heart is like a clock, as well as an 
engine. If I do not wind the clock, what happens? 

Percy: It runs down. 

Mother: Does some one need to wind up your heart 
each day to keep it beating? 

Helen: Oh, no; it just keeps going itself! 

Mother: God keeps It beating, sometimes for a hun- 
dred years, without our help. I read a little poem not long 
ago about the heart, which I will repeat for you: — 

THE CLOCK OF LIFE. 

"Oh, did you ever think, my child, 
That in your body dwells 
A tiny clock, that verily 
All other clocks excels? 

"It needs no key to wind it up, 
No oiling of the wheels. 
No jeweler to make repairs; 
With such it never deals. 



A PiDiiping Engme. 



1 17 



* * Near seventy ticks a minute is 
Its normal race to go; 
Just place your thumb against your wrist, 
And you will find it so. 

"This little clock was made to be 
A faithful sentinel, 
To give alarm of any change 
Within its prison cell. 

"If you are healthy, then its ticks 
Are even, full, and strong; 
By this you know that, in its cell, 
Nothing is going wrong. 

' ' When sickness comes, it works so hard. 
And is so feeble, too, 
It can not keep the perfect time 
Its Maker meant it to. 

"Now, would you help this little clock 
The best of time to keep ? 
Then always mind the rules of health, 
And thus their blessings reap." 

— Mrs. Julia Loomis. 





THE CARETAKER 

MY: Just see, mother! I have cut my 
finger. See how fast the blood runs 
out! Oh-h! 
Mother : Suppose we let a drop fall 
on this glass and then try to find out what 
it is made of, what it does in the body, and about 
the different rooms it visits. You may ask questions 
and I will try to answer them; but first we will bind 
up the cut finger in this bit of soft cloth. We have 
already learned how blood is made, but we want to learn 
what it does for us. 

Blood is made from the food you eat and the water 
you drink. If you eat good food it makes good blood. 
Bad food and drink make bad blood. It might be called 
the caretaker, or the housekeeper of the body. Without 
it your body-house would go to ruin ; for the Bible says, 
''The life of all flesh is the blood." After passing through 
the kitchen, serving room, and dining room, the blood enters 
a dark tunnel and comes to your heart. 

Helen: But what makes it such a bright red color? 
Mother: Because it has millions of little red bodies 
called cor'pus-cles. Really it is a pale yellow, but there are 
so many of these tiny folk floating around that they make it 
(ii8) 



The Caretaker. 1 1 9 

look red, just as a river would if it were packed full of tiny 
red fishes, or as water would if you should fill a bottle with 
very small red beads and then cover them with water. 

Percy: But are all the cor'pus-cles red? 

Mother: No; some are white, but there are many 
more red than white. 

Amy: What do they look like? ^ © |^ 

Mother: You can not see them ,r^C^ (n\ 
at all unless you should look through ^/!!^ /^ \l){ 
a mi'cro-scope. The red cor'pus-cles z?^ ^ 
are shaped like a little biscuit with a ^^ ^^ 
dimple in the middle. The white ones 

keep changing their shape in a very wonderful way. First 
they are round, then square, then three-cornered, and they 
take on ever so many other shapes. There are several 
millions of these little red and white fellows in a single drop 
of blood. 

Elmer: But you said it went through a dark tunnel 
to get to the heart. Please tell us about that. 

Mother: The tunnel is round, like a tube, and I must 
tell you that these tubes are in every part of your body. 
Some are quite large, some are small, and some are so tiny 
that you could not see them if you should try. They are like 
a tree with its trunk dividing into large branches, and these 
into smaller ones, till at last they become little twigs. The 
largest tubes for carrying blood through the body are called 
arteries. The smaller ones are called veins. The arteries 
carry fresh, bright, clean blood to every part of your body- 
house. It bounds along with a hop, skip, and jump, as 



I20 The House We Live In. 

though it were in a hurry to get to work. The arteries 
have very strong walls, and, as I told you, the blood soon 
finds itself in the heart. 

Helen: Which room did it go into first? 

Mother : When the blood is fi'esh and clean it goes 
into the top room on the left side. It keeps coming in 
until the room is filled full. Then the little folding doors 
open, and the blood is crowded into the lower left room, 
the doors fly back, and — 

Amy: But please tell us about the doors. 

Mother: They are made so that the blood could not get 
back into the top room if it wished ; for they never swing 
but one way, and some small cords hold them in place. 
These doors are called valves. When the lower room is 
filled, the walls press together, and the blood is forced into 
the largest blood tube in the body, the walls of which are 
so very smooth, that the blood passes along with a merry 
bound. The tube keeps growing smaller the farther we go 
from the heart, and branches into many smaller tubes. 

Percy: And how far does the blood go.** 

Mother: Perhaps it first takes a trip through the trunk 
of your body, down through your right leg, and on to the 
end of your big toe. The tubes at last become very small, 
and there are so many of them that they are like a network 
of the finest lace. A hair would seem like a big rope beside 
them. They are so very tiny that you can not see them. 
Their walls are thinner than tissue paper, and they are so 
close together that you can not touch your skin with the 
point of a needle without touching some of them. When 



The Caretaker. 



121 



Vein 



the blood comes to these tiny tubes, it does not travel so 
fast as at first, and as it passes along, the muscles pick 
it to pieces, take the part they want as food, and load the 
blood down with waste which they can not use. When 
they are so hungry, the blood is glad to feed them and 
give them the oxygen, which makes them warm. 
Amy: Did it stay long in those little tubes .^^ 
Mother: No; it went through as quickly as it could, 
and on its way back found itself in bigger tubes, which keep 
growing larger; for it is now on its 
way back to the heart. This picture 
will help you to see the road it 
travels. It is now a dark red color, 
and unfit to work longer till it is 
washed. Back it goes to the heart, 
the tubes through which it travels 
growing larger all the way until it 
tumbles into the right top room of 
the heart, which, as you have learned, 
always has dirty, worn-out blood in it. 
to stay there ; for between this room and the lower right 
room there are three folding doors kept in place like the 
two on the left side, and through them it passes. The 
walls of the rooms on the right side of the heart are not 
as thick as those on the left side. I think that must be 
because the left side sends the blood farther than the right. 
Helen: Does the blood stop to rest in the lower right 



Artery 




But it is not allowed 



room ? 



Mother: Oh, no; it never rests as long as there is 



122 The House We Live In. 

any life in it! The heart squeezes it out into another 
big tube, and it soon finds itself in the bath room, where it 
is washed through and throuo^h, and its color becomes as 
briorht red as when new. 

Amy: And where does the blood then go? 

Mother: Straight back to the left side of the heart, 
where it is pumped out the same as before; and this time 
we will say it goes to the kitchen of the house you live in, 
and helps the cook get the dinner you have eaten ready to 
be made into more blood. The old blood eats some of the 
good things, and again it is sent to the right side of the 
heart and back through the bath room. 

Percy: And what then? 

Mother: Its next trip may be taken to the brain, to 
help a little girl learn her lessons in school. The brain 
takes what it can use, and back the blood goes to the right 
heart, around through the bath room again, and the next 
time it may be sent to the liver, where it finds sugar and 
bile-making going on, as usual. 

Elmer : But how can the blood be of any use there ? 

Mother: I think you would not ask such a question if 
you could go there to see. It ''takes all the starch out of 
it," as you sometimes say, and some other things besides, to 
make into sugar. It also uses part of it to make into bitter 
bile, so you may well believe that when it goes back to the 
heart there is not much left that is of value. But after a 
good wash in the bath room the blood goes back to the 
heart, and this time may be sent to the bones in your fin- 
gers, and they take what lime it has. This drop was just 



The Caretaker. 123 

making its way back to the heart again when Amy cut her 
finger and let it out. 

Percy: But I should have thought the blood would 
have been worn out making so many trips. 

Mother : So it would if it was not made new by the 
food you eat. It keeps taking as well as giving as it goes 
round and round through the body. You would not expect 
a housekeeper to keep everything tidy and clean in a house, 
and not give her what she needed to make her strong and 
able to work ; and so the master of the house gives the 
blood plenty to eat; and it makes no complaint as long as 
it can do its work well. It is a very busy person, we might 
say, and, as there is no end of things to do in the house 
in which you live, the blood works night and day. 

Elmer : But I don't see how the blood can take with it 
all that is needed to mend the different parts of the house. 

Mother: It is supposed to carry with it a supply of 
everything that is needed to keep the house in order as it 
goes, so that when a bone says, *'I want some lime," or a 
muscle says, ''Please give me some al-bumen," each part 
gets what it calls for if it is in the blood. Whether it has 
what every part needs depends on what the master of the 
house sends into the kitchen to make blood. Have I told 
you about the filters in the body.'^ 

Amy: I'm sure you have not. Please tell us now. 

Mother: There are two of them in the lower part of 
the trunk close to the back, one on each side. They are 
the shape of a bean, and are called the kidneys. The 
blood passes through them, and some of the poisons it has 



124 



Tlie Hott.se IVe Live In. 




A kidney. 



picked up are strained out and sent to a storeroom, called 
the bladder, where they are kept till the brain gives an 

order to send them away. 

Helen: But there is one thing 
I would like to know. I can see 
how blood can run down-hill into 
our fingers and toes, but I can't 
see how it can climb back up to 
the heart again. Will you please 
tell me ? 

Mother: The heart is the 
power that sends it through the 
arteries to every part of the body, whether it is up-hill or 
down. Now when the blood has come to the end of its 
journey, and has reached the tiny hair-like veins of which 
I told you, more blood keeps coming down and pushes it 
on till it starts back through the larger veins. 
The blood keeps crowding behind, and the veins 
are made in such a way as to help it climb up. 
Percy : But how are they different from the 
arteries .-^ 

Mother: Did you ever see little watch- 
pockets hung in bedrooms in which to put 
watches? Well, the veins have tiny pockets in 
them, as you see in the picture. 

Amy : But I don't see how that helps the blood in 
climbing. 

Mother: It is this way: If you had a tube with little 
pockets and should hold it so the top of the pockets was 




' Veins have tiny 
pockets in them.' 



The Caretaker, 125 

down, you could pour anything through it and they would 
not stop it from passing. But turn the tube the other way, 
with the pockets up, as you see in the picture, and they 
would catch and hold anything you tried to pour through 
the tube. It is the same way with the veins and the blood. 
If the blood should try to go back, the pockets would fill 
full and hold it, but when it is passing up toward the heart, 
they let it slip by without holding it back. 

Elmer: Then the blood keeps going round and round 
in the body, and never stops. 

Mother: Yes; and this ''going round and round," as 
you say, is called the cir-cu-la'tion. This drop of blood 
would have kept going until it was used up in mending 
your body and helping keep it alive, if it had not slipped 
out through the cut in Amy's finger into the world in 
which you live and move. 

I know you have all enjoyed hearing how the blood 
travels through the body. Let me tell you a little story I 
read of what a boy said in school. His teacher asked him 
to tell the class how the blood cir'cu-lates, or goes round 
and round. 

"Please, sir," said the lad, ''the blood goes down one leg 
and up the other." 

"Very clever of it, I am sure," said the teacher. ''How 
does it get across?'' 

Perhaps that was something the boy had not thought 
of, and I am sure you would never give such an answer as 
that since you have heard the story of a drop of blood. 
Let us see the cut finger where it came out. 



126 The House We Live In. 

Amy: It doesn't bleed at all now, mother. 

Mother: No; and that makes me think to tell you 
something else about this wonderful caretaker. If we had 
a quart of blood and should let It stand awhile, it would 
become thick like jelly. But if you should take a bundle 
of twigs and keep stirring it round and round, it would not 
get thick at all. If you looked at your bundle of twigs 
after stirring the blood with it, you would find the twigs 
covered with a sticky substance. If you should wash them, 
you would wash away the red color, and would have left a 
soft, stringy mass all matted together. 

Helen: But what Is It good for.'^ 

Mother: It is called fibrin, and if it were not in the 
blood, you would bleed to death If you cut yourself So 
long as the blood stays in the body, the fibrin goes quietly 
with it wherever it goes ; but If It begins to run away, 
as it did from Amy's finger, the fibrin goes to work at 
once to cork up the place so it can not get out. 

Percy: How long does It take the blood to go from the 
heart through the body and back again, mother? 

Mother : I am sure you will be surprised when I tell 
you that the heart sends It with such force that it will go 
to the farthest part and get back in from three to eight 
minutes, and some say it takes even less time than that. 

Elmer: What! so quickly as that! It does not seem 
possible. 

Mother : And though one-eighth of the body Is blood, 
yet it will all pass through the heart in about the same time. 

Helen: How wonderful! But I don't see how all these 



The Caretaker. iiy 

little things in the blood, called cor'pus-cles, can get through 
the tiny, hair-like veins, which are so small. 

Mother: We can learn a useful lesson from them, and 
you would be pleased, I know, to watch them, if they were 
only large enough so you could. They seem to know just 
what they want to do, and where they ought to go. When 
the little veins are too small for more than one to go in at 
a time, they do not push or crowd one another. One row 
waits as politely as can be till the others have passed in, 
and then they follow. How wonderful it is to think of this 
river of life flowing round and round, and we feel nothing 
of it but the gentle tap, tap of the heart as it sends it 
bounding through every part of the body! Should it stop, 
we would die; for ''the blood is the life." 

Percy: But how did people find out that the blood 
goes around as it does? 

Mother: A doctor in England, named Harvey, first 
discovered it. Before his time people thought air went 
around through the body in the arteries. Men have studied 
the subject since Dr. Harvey lived, and they keep learning 
more about it all the time. 

Amy: Does water go into the blood, mother? 

Mother: Yes; it very quickly finds its way there, and 
it Is the same with strong drinks, such as beer and whisky. 
It only takes a very few minutes for anything we drink to 
get into the blood stream. 

The walls of the veins and arteries are governed by 
the nerves of our telephone system. They let just the 
right amount of blood flow through them all the time. 



128 The House We Live In. 

When alcohol gets into the blood, it outs the nerves to 
sleep, and so too much blood goes into the little veins. 
You knov^ a man who drinks has a red face. If he drinks 
a long time, his nose gets so red that it is called a ''rum 
blossom." This is because so much blood goes to his nose 
that it becomes large and red. Alcohol also makes the 
walls of the arteries weak, so they sometimes burst open 
and the person dies. 

Now that we have learned a few things about the blood, 
we must be careful what we give this care-taker of the body 
to eat. We have learned very little of what there is to 
know, and as you grow older I hope you will study and 
learn more. 



'Sii\ 




THE BATHROOM 



ELEN: I have been thinking of what 
you said about the blood being washed 
every time it made a trip to any part 
of the body. Where is the bath room 
in the body-house, mother? 

Mother: It is a large double room, 
and it is found in the top part of the 
trunk, each side of the heart. 

Percy: Why, I thought that was 
where the lungs are. 

Mother: So it is; and it is in them 
that the blood is made clean after every 
journey it takes through the body. 

Amy: But is there water in the 
lungs in which to wash the blood ? 
and the blood could not be washed in 
It takes air to wash blood. Let us try 
to learn how it is done; but first we will take a peep into 
the bath room. There are two ways to get in. One is 
through the folding doors, the way that our food goes to 
the kitchen; for you remember there are four or five doors 
back of the pink curtain. In this place the air finds a door 
9 (129) 



Mother: No 
water if there was 



I30 



The House We Live In. 



standing wide open, and it passes through a passage, called 
the windpipe, which is about three-fourths of an inch wide, 
and about four and one-half inches long in grown people. 
After going through the windpipe it comes to two passages, 
leading to the two parts of the bath room. While we might 
call it a double bath room, yet it is really two rooms. 
Elmer: That must be the right and left lungs. 

Mother: That is right. But I must 
not forget to tell you that there is another 
way to reach the lungs, and that is through 
two little doors, always standing 
open, just above the folding doors 
which lead to the kitchen. The 
air finds a long, curved pas- 
sage to go through, and this 
is much the better way to go, 
because if it goes in cold, it 
passes some places where it 
gets warm before reaching the 
bath room. You know it would 
be rather hard to wash clothes 
in cold water, and so it is much I etter 'to have warm than 
cold air in which to cleanse the blood. 

Helen: You mean it passes through the nostrils in 
the nose. 

Mother: Yes; and another reason why this is the 
best way for it to go is because the air is filtered or strained 
through some little hairs, which do their best to keep any 
dirt or dust which may be in the air from going further. 




rhe lungs 



The Bath Room, 



13 



These passages open back of the pink curtain, and it goes 
down through the windpipe the same as though it had 
passed through the mouth. 

Percy: But I should think our food would go into the 
bath room instead of the kitchen. 

Mother: It would, only that, as soon as it starts for 
the kitchen, there is a little trap-door which feels it coming, 
and it shuts down quickly over the air passage, so nothing 
can get through. Suppose the trap-door does not do its 
duty quickly enough, and food "goes the wrong way," as 
we sometimes say, the person chokes and has a bad time 
till the food is out of the way. I once saw a fowl eating 
corn, and in some way a kernel got into her windpipe. She 
began hopping about in great distress, and died as quickly 
as though her head had been cut off. It sometimes happens 
that people are choked to death In the same way. 

Helen: But how does the bath room look.? 

Mother: It Is a pretty pink color and seems much 
like a very fine sponge. If we could go Inside we should 
find the passages divided again and again, till there are 
thousands and thousands of tiny air tubes, each ending In 
a little pouch quite like a bunch of grapes, 
only you should think of the grapes as being 
as small as a grain of sand. When 
the lungs are full of air, they grow 
larger, and when we breathe it out, 
they grow small. 

Elmer: That is like a pair 
of bellows. 




A pair of belloxvs. 



132 The House We Live In. 

Mother: Very much the same, and the bellows will 
help us understand how we breathe. Try to think of a 
little tree with its trunk, limbs, and leaves all hollow. If 
air were blown through the trunk, it would make every leaf 
puff out, and when no air was blown in, they would fall 
together again. It is the same with our lungs. They keep 
swelling out and falling together about eighteen times every 
minute. 

Amy: But how is the blood washed in air, mother? 

Mother: Perhaps it would be better to say it is aired, 
the same as we hang a garment in the sunshine and wind 
to make it fresh and sweet. You will remember that the 
blood takes oxygen, which is a part of the air, to every 
part of the body-house, and this makes it warm. In 
exchange the muscles give the blood a poison called car- 
bonic acid gas. This gives the blood a dark, purplish 
color, and it must carry away the gas and get more oxygen 
before it can do any more work in mending the body. 

Percy: But I would like to know how it gets into the 
bath room. 

Mother: The right side of the heart, which has noth- 
ing but soiled blood in it all the time, sends it to the lungs 
in a hurry, and it fills the thousands of hair-like veins which 
are in every part of the lungs. The walls of the veins are 
so thin that the oxygen in the lungs soaks through into 
the blood, and the poison in the blood goes through into 
the air, and is breathed out of the body. Do you under- 
stand it now? 

Percy: I think so. 



The Bath Room, 133 

Mother: If I should tie a piece of bladder over a glass 
of milk and place the glass in a bucket of water, the milk 
would come through into the water, and the water would 
pass into the milk, even though they were in separate 
dishes. Another way to show how the blood is cleansed 
would be to say that blood and air keep running near 
together, each in its own room, and as they pass they say, 
"Good-day;" air washes blood so it becomes bright and 
clean, and blood makes air very dirty with its poison gas; 
and, after trading in this way, both hurry along as fast as 
they came in. 

Elmer: It must be that good air is needed more than 
good food. 

Mother: Why, yes; for while we need to eat only two 
or three times a day, we must take in air more than twenty- 
five thousand times. If we could not breathe for six or 
seven minutes, we would die, while we could live without 
food quite a number of days. How thankful we ought to 
be for pure, fresh air! And there is so much of it that 
we can have it without money and without price. 

Helen: Which is best, to breathe through the nose 
or the mouth .'^ 

Mother: Through the nose; for that was made for 
the air to pass through. Serious sickness of the throat 
and lungs is sometimes caused by breathing through the 
mouth. When the air goes this way, the person makes a 
very strange noise when asleep. The air seems to be 
trying to wake somebody up to shut the folding doors so 
it can go the right way. We call it snoring. 



134 



The House We Live In, 



Percy : I should think when there are so many people 
and animals, and all must have air to breathe, that it would 
soon become unfit to use. 

Mother: We live in an ocean of air, as fishes live in 




"As fishes live in the seay 

the sea. The winds sweep it round and round, and every- 
thing that grows helps to make it pure. 

Amy: How can that be? 

Mother: It may be said that plants breathe, as well 
as people, only they need the poison gas we breathe out, 
and they give out the oxygen we need to breathe in. 
There is no danger but we can get all the air we need if 
we will let it into our rooms. 

Elmer: But isn't night air bad to breathe, mother? 

Mother: No; for when it is night we can get nothing 



The Bath Room. 135 

but night air. It is true that if air is shut up in a room it 
soon becomes unfit to breathe, whether it is night or day. 

Percy : On frosty mornings my breath looks like steam 
as it comes out. Is that the poison gas, mother.'* 

Mother: No; we can not see the gas, but what you 
see is the water we breathe out. We take in about a pint 
of air at every breath, and it is said that every time we 
breathe out we spoil half a barrelful of air, making it unfit 
to breathe. I will let you find out how many barrelfuls 
of fresh air we would need in an hour. 

Percy: Why, that would be over five hundred barrels! 
Who ever thought that we needed such a lot of fresh air 
in just one hour! 

Mother : And who, then, would think of using only 
one roomful in a whole night! It is no wonder that many 
people have a headache when they wake in the morning. 

Helen : But, mother, we can't get clean air always, 
even when we are not in the house. This very day a man 
puffed tobacco smoke into my face as I was passing him. 

Amy: But do you think it is right, mother, for any 
one to poison the pure, fresh air God has given us, with 
tobacco smoke, and make it unfit to use? 

Mother: No; I do not; and a true gentleman will not do 
it. It is both rude and wrong. He not only wrongs others 
but harms himself. You know how it feels to get smoke 
into your eyes, and it is just as bad for the throat and 
lungs. Bad smells of any kind poison the air, making it 
unfit to breathe, so we should be careful to keep our rooms 
and everything about the house sweet and clean. 



136 The House We Live In. 

Percy: I met a man in the street, and I could smell the 
whisky he had drunk. Did that come from his lungs ? 

Mother: Yes; just as soon as strong drink is swal- 
lowed, every part of the body tries to get rid of it. The 
alcohol in such drinks makes the thin walls of the lungs 
hard, so they can not make the blood clean, and they try 
to throw out the poison. Sometimes it causes that dreadful 
disease, consumption, which can not be cured. 

Helen: Don't a great many people die of consumption ? 

Mother: Yes; it kills more people than any other dis- 
ease; so every one should take good care of their lungs, 
and give them plenty of room to grow. They should also 
breathe pure, fresh air at all times. 

Elmer: But you can't squeeze the lungs. We must 
have room to breathe. 

Mother: But we can squeeze the stomach and liver so 
that the lungs do not have room, and by stooping over 
when sitting or walking, we get round shoulders and narrow 
chests, and this causes the lungs to become small and 
diseased. 

Amy: I once read how some people on a ship suffered 
for fresh air. 

Mother: Please tell us about it. 

Amy : One night when there was a storm the captain 
told the sailors to send the people down into a large room 
below deck so they would not be in the way. After they 
had gone, the doors were fastened, so they could not get 
out. When the storm was over, the sailors took a candle 
and opened the door, but when they went in, the candle 



X 



The Bath Room. 137 

went out. At last enough fresh air got in so the candle 
would burn. They found the poor people lying on the 
floor, and quite a number of them were dead. 

Mother: I suppose they had no air to breathe only 
that which had been used over and over again, and as 
that was not fresh, it poisoned them so they died. We 
should learn from this sad story to keep the lungs well 
filled with good air; for the blood can not be well cleansed 
if it is impure. 




HOUSE 15 







HEWED 




<i. 



"M 



^:*; 



OTHlER: If you touch a stone, Amy, how does 
it feel? 

Amy: It is cold. 

Mother: Yes, wood, iron, glass, and all the 
thinofs around us which do not have life, are cold. 
If you touch your head, how does it feel? 
Percy: It is warm. 
Mother: We sometimes see a Uttle glas' tube called a 
thermometer, with figures telling us how warm or how cold 
the air is. Here is a smaller one that you may hold in your 
mouth under your tongue, Elmer, and we will see if it will tell 
us how warm the house you live in is inside. That will do. 
The glass says it is about ninety-eight degrees. How many 
degrees will the larger glass record on a hot summer day? 
Elmer: It is very warm when it is over eighty or 
ninety in the shade. 

Mother: Yet you see that inside the body-house it is 
nearly one hundred degrees, yet you do not feel too warm. 
Are all animals warm ? 

Helen: If they are alive, they are. If their bodies are 
cold, we say they are dead. 

Mother: Some birds and animals have more heat in 

(138) 







1 


•li 


140- 




1 


120- 






100- 




1 


80- 




.1 


to- 






10- 




1 






h 


ao- 


■ 


1 




^1 



How the House Is Heated. 



139 



I 

Fever 
theV' 
mometer. 



good 



their bodies than we do. The horse has one hundred 
degrees, the ox one hundred and one, the dog one hun- 
dred and two, the sheep one hundred and four, and the 
duck and pigeon have one hundred and eight. The bodies 
of some creatures, such as fishes and frogs, are much cooler 
than our own, and we call them cold-blooded. The frog 
has only seventy degrees of heat. 

Helen: But what makes us warm, mother? 

Mother: Do you remember that we talked 
deal about our food as fuel not long ago? 

Percy: But, mother, fuel is something 
to burn^ and there Is no fire inside of us. 

Mother: That Is true in one way; 
but let us see if we can find out where 
the heat in our bodies comes from. It 
may be a little hard to understand, but 
we will try. Here is a candle. If lighted, 
it burns brightly. Now I will fasten a 
wire around it and lower it into this glass 
jar and cover it tightly. Now watch it. 
What is the matter? 

Amy: It is going out. Now it just flickers and hardly 
burns at all. Why does it go out, mother? 

Mother: Because all fire must have a part of the air 
called oxygen to make it burn. When the candle can have 
plenty of air, it burns brightly, but when shut up closely, 
where it soon uses all the oxygen, it will not burn at all. 
Now our bodies are much like the candle. We eat food, 
and when it is made into blood, it mixes with the oxygen 




'Now watch it. 



m 



140 Tke House We Live In. 

we breathe, and as it goes round and round in the body, it 
makes heat. The difference between us and the candle is 
that the burning does not go on as fast in our bodies as 
in the candle, so there is no flame, and it would take much 
longer to make the same amount of heat. If you throw 
a piece of fat into the fire, it will burn. If you eat the 
fat, it will make just as much heat in your body, but it 
will last a long time. 

Percy: How queer to think we are burning, bit by bit, 
just like a candle! 

Mother: Yes; just as long as we live, the fire is kept 
going. 

Amy: But I shouldn't think that blood going around 
with oxygen in it would keep us warm. 

Mother: If that was the only way to heat the body, 
it would not. Where it is very cold, some houses have a 
grate ; there may also be a furnace, and perhaps a stove 
besides. So there are three ways of heating the house we 
live in. The first, as I have told you, is by the blood 
carrying oxygen to every part of the body. That is like 
the grate. We will call the liver the furnace. We have 
found that all the starch and sweet things we eat are 
changed into liver sugar, and it is supposed this is used in 
the lungs to keep the body warm. 

Helen: In what other way is the house heated.^ 

Elmer: I think I know. It is by exercise. When I 
run or play ball I become very warm. 

Mother: Yes, when we move quickly, we breathe 




How the House Is Heated. 



141 



faster, and the blood goes bounding through every part 
of the body, so the fire inside burns brightly. Sawing 
wood is a • good way to warm a cold boy, and a broom 
is a fine helper to warm a cold girl. 

Amy: When it is frosty, we can see our 
breath. Is that the smoke coming from the 
fire inside, mother? 

Mother: You may call it that if you 
ike. When a candle burns, it gives off 
what we call carbonic acid gas, and we 
breathe out some of the same kind of 
gas. Water also comes out in the 
breath like steam from an engine, half 
a pint or a pint each day. 

Elmer: Do some kinds of food 
make more heat than others .'^ 
Mother: Yes; all kinds of 
fatty foods make heat. In very 
cold countries people can eat 
more fat and keep well than in warm cli- 
mates. Esquimaux eat a great deal of fat. 
A little Esquimau child would eat a tallow 
candle and enjoy it as much as you would an 
orange. I once read of some sailors who 
made a Christmas tree for some of those 
children in the frozen north. The tree was 
made of walrus bones tied together, and, in- 
stead of popcorn, fruit, and sweetmeats, 
they hung balls of fat on the tree. The 

"^ fine helper to warm, a cold girl. 




'A good way to warm a 
cold boyy 




/ 




142 The House We Live In. 

children thought it a great treat, and ate them as quickly 
as you would eat peaches. 

Amy: How funny! But, mother, are not our bodies 
warmer in summer than in winter? 

Mother: You feel warmer, it is true; but, no matter 
how hot or cold the weather may be, the body has always 
about the same warmth. I said always, but I mean when 
we are well. Sometimes we put the wrong 
kind of fuel into the furnace, and it makes 
a big fire, the house gets very hot, and 
we say we have a "fever." 
If we get two or three de- 
'We have a^everr' grees cooler than we should 

be, that shows that something is wrong, too. 

Helen: But what keeps us the same whether it is hot 
or cold ^ 

Mother: You know some stoves have dampers to gov- 
ern the heat. When the body is in danger of becoming 
too warm, that is, when the body is well, all the little waste- 
pipes in the covering of our house pour out water so the 
skin is damp or moist, and if very warm it is wet. We 
might say we have thousands of little "dampers" to keep 
the heat just right. As the sweat dries, the body becomes 
cool; so in summer and in hot climates the people sweat 
much. In winter and in cold countries they perspire but 
little, and the tiny waste-pipes close as tightly as they can 
to keep the cold out and the heat inside. 

Percy: But when I had a cold my skin was hot and 
dry. Why did not the litde dampers make me cool, then? 



How the House Is Heated, 143 

Mother: Because they were clogged so they could not. 
After a warm foot-bath and a hot lemon drink, you began 
to sweat and soon became well. If nothing had been done 
to open the waste-pipes, you might have had a serious illness. 

Elmer: Does alcohol make the body warm."* I once 
heard a man say it was so cold that he must take some- 
thing to keep him from freezing, as he had a long journey 
before him. 

Mother: I am sure he did not know the effect of wine 
or alcohol or he would not have said that. When first 
taken, these stimulants drive the blood to the skin, and we 
feel warmer; but soon the blood goes back, after being 
chilled, and the whole body becomes colder. No, alcohol 
in any of its forms will not "keep out the cold," as people 
sometimes think. Men in frozen countries endure the cold 
much better when they take no strong drink of any kind. 

Helen: I once read of a party of twenty-six men who 
lost their way as night came on. It was very, very cold, 
and they had no way of making a fire. Each man had 
two blankets and plenty of food and whisky. Their leader 
told them to let the whisky alone; to eat supper, and then 
wrap up in their blankets and lie closely together. But 
only two besides himself did as he said, and, though they 
were cold, they did not suffer or freeze. The others thought 
the whisky would keep them warm. Three drank a very 
little, and they did not freeze. Seven others, who drank 
more, had their toes and fingers frozen. Six, who drank 
still more, were so badly frozen that they never got over it. 
Four, who became drunk, were frozen so that they soon 



144 



The House We Live In. 



died; and three, who drank so much that they became 
''dead drunk," were dead In the morning. 

Mother: That was surely a good test, showing how 
much alcohol can do toward keeping the body warm. 

Percy: Why do we need clothes to keep us warm? 
The birds and animals don't wear any? 




^' Birds have a cloak ofjeafhers." 

Mother: I think they do. The birds have a cloak of 
feathers, which they puff out to keep them warm when it is 
cold. The horse and cow have coats of hair. The sheep 
has a thick woolen dress. Animals living where it is very 
cold have warm suits of fur. Our skin is not covered as 
theirs is, and our bodies would lose much heat if exposed 
to the air. Food makes heat, and our clothes keep us from 
losing it. We need clothing to keep us warm. 

Helen: But people do not need clothing in warm 
countries. 

Mother: And they do not wear much; but we would 
need it if there, to keep the hot sun from scorching the 
skin. We should never wear heavy clothing, and it should 
be made so loose that it will not hinder the growth or 



How the House Is Heated. 145 

movements of the body. The shoulders should carry its 
weight. When the warm days of spring come, it is not 
best to be in a hurry to leave off our warm under-clothing. 
Many persons have died because of doing so. 

AxMV : Should our clothes be changed often '^ 

Mother: At least those worn next the skin should be, 
in order that we may keep neat and clean. Clothes worn 
in the daytime should not be worn at night, and night- 
clothes and bedclothes should be kept fresh and well aired. 
If the clothing we are wearing gets wet, it should be 
changed at once. Never wear wet shoes or stockings or 
wet clothing of any kind. Which part of the body do you 
think should have the warmest clothing .^ 

Amy : The part farthest from the heart ; for that would 
get colder than any other. 

Mother: Yes, the limbs should be warmly clad; for 
the blood often gets chilled before it reaches the fingers 
and toes, and that is why they get cold sooner than do 
other parts of the body. Yet I have seen many little boys 
and girls with warm coats and furs around the chest, where 
there is the most heat, and a part of the tender limbs had 
no clothing. That is like trying to keep the furnace warm, 
and letting the rooms farther away have no heat at all. 

Percy : I should think children dressed in that way 
would be ill. 

Mother : Many of them are. They often have bad 

colds, and sometimes the lungs get so much blood, because 

it is chilled away from the parts to which it should go, that 

they can not do their work properly; the throat becomes 
10 



146 The House We Live In 

sore, and the poor child may lose its life because the 
mother did not know how to dress it. Your father, 
though he is a strong man, would suffer if clothed in that 
way. Let us see if we can not make some good rules for 
clothing the body. 

Elmer: I will make the first, which is, Wear loose, 
light clothing. 

Amy: Then don't be in a hurry in the spring to change 
warm clothes for those that are cooler. 

Helen: We should keep all our clothing neat and clean. 

Percy: That which is worn in the daytime should not 
be worn at night. 

Amy: That makes me think of another: Nightclothes 
and bedclothes should be fresh and well aired. 

Elmer: And we should change our wet clothes for 
dry ones. 

Percy: The limbs should be as warmly dressed as any 
part of the body. 

Mother: Well done. I think these are all good rules. 
Let us see how well we can keep them. 



TI 



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WW^-^ 



:'\:-\\ 



Vifciatt- • 






?S"'cJjfeIii 



M^w^^m^i 



OTHER: Do you think of any 
musical instruments which need air '^ 
when they make a sound? 

Percy: The cornet, flute, and horn. 

Amy: And the organ, too. 

Mother: Yes; all of these and others 
as well must have air to make sound. But 
I wanted to tell you that in the wonderful 
house we live in there is the most perfect 
organ you can imagine. I am sure there 
is none like it, none that can make such 
sweet music, and I have seen many, and 
heard the largest pipe-organ in the world. 

Helen: Where can it be.'^ 

Mother: And it not only makes the 
finest, sweetest music, but it can laugh and 
talk. Sometimes its tone is soft and sweet, 
but it can be made loud and harsh if the 
master wishes. This curious little organ 
has a room all to itself, and — 

C147) 



148 



The House We Live In. 




Elmer: Do you mean the voice? 
Mother: There! you guessed it the first time. 
Amy: Where is the organ, mother? 
Mother: In the top of the windpipe, in the throat. It 
is really a part of the windpipe itself, and this curious little 

room has walls at the sides, 
but no floor. The little trap- 
door which keeps food from 
going to the bath room forms 
the top of the music room. 
Comet. Percy: How large is it? 

Mother: It is larger in men than in women, and you 
can see the front part in a boy's throat. Sometimes it is 
called ''Adam's apple." I once read that perhaps the reason 
it has this name is because when Adam was eating his apple 
he was in such a hurry to blame Eve for giving it to him 
that a quarter stuck in his throat. We know that he laid 
the blame on Eve for his eating the forbidden fruit, but 
whether it was apples or some other kind of fruit I do not 
know, so you need not believe this story. 

Elmer: But I would like to know what causes all the 
different sounds which are made by the voice. 

Mother : I will try to make it as plain as I can. Near 
the top of this room two cords are stretched across from 
front to back. These cords stretch like India-rubber, so 
they can be made tight or loose. There is an open space 
between them, where the air can pass through, but the 
other space is filled up. Did you ever see the little piece 
of brass in an organ called a "reed"? 



I 



J 



Flute. 



The Music Room. 



149 



r^ 



Helen: I saw one when our organ was cleaned. 
Mother: Here is a picture of one. You see it has a 
little tongue, and when air is blown through the opening 
in the reed, the tongue vibrates, that is, it goes up 
and down so fast that you can hardly see it, and this 
makes the sound. The smaller the tongue, the faster 
it will vibrate, and the tone will be higher. 

Amy: But how is it that we can speak and sing 
low or high.-* 

Mother: Our lungs are like the bellows of the 
organ, and the voice cords are like the reeds. When 
the master of the body wants to speak 
low, he sends an order to some mus- 
cles in the throat to let the cords 
hang loose. If he wishes a high 
tone, he tells them to stretch the cords 
tight. If he would make no sound, the 
cords hang loosely, and the air passes 
between them without making any sound. 

Elmer : How strange that, with only two cords, we can 
make nearly all tones made by the piano, which has so many! 
Mother: That shows how much better God can make 
anything than men can. Perhaps the violin is more like 
the voice ; for it can make more tones on fewer cords ; but, 
though it can be made to produce very sweet sounds, it can 
not be compared to a trained voice, which can speak words 
and make music at the same time. 

Helen: I'm glad I can talk and sing. 

Mother : The voice is a gift of God. How we pity 




Organ. 



150 The House We Live In. 

a person who is dumb ! Every one should learn to speak in 
a clear, gentle voice. A harsh word wounds the one to 
whom it is spoken; and the tone often strikes deeper than 
the words. We have all felt soothed and comforted by- 
kind, pleasant words. All who can should learn to sing. 

' ' If you have a pleasant thought, 
Sing it, sing it; 
Like the birdies in their sport, 
Sing it from the heart." 

"It is not so much what you say, 

As the manner in which you say it; 

It is not so much the language you use, 

As the tones in which you convey it. 

"'Come here,' I sharply said, 

And the baby cowered and wept; 
'Come here,' I cooed, and he looked and smiled, 
And straight to my lap he crept. 

* ' The words may be mild and fair, 

And the tones may pierce like a dart; 
The words may be soft as the summer air. 
And the tones may break the heart. 

' ' For words but come from the mind, 
And grow by study and art; 
But the tones leap forth from the inner self, 

And reveal the state of the heart. • 

"Whether you know it or not, 
Whether you mean or care — 
Gentleness, kindness, love, and hate, 
Envy, and anger are there. 

"Then, would you quarrels avoid, 
And in peace and love rejoice, 
Keep anger not only out of your words, 
But keep it out of your voice." 




OTHER: While we have but one voice room, 
we have two hearing rooms or passages, and 
they are the most wonderful of any you ever did 
see. One is placed on each side of the head. 

Elmer: Those are the ears, I know. Please let us 
send a sound through them, mother, and you tell us what 
it finds. 

Mother: Very well; and we will suppose this sound 
has eyes as well as a tongue, and it will tell us what it 
sees. Now listen: — 

All sounds are made of such tiny waves, so very, very 
small, that you can never see them, yet they are something 
like those you see when you throw a stone into the pond. 
The first thing a sound finds when it wishes to visit the 
master of the body-house, is a pretty porch just 
outside of the passage made for it to enter. 

Amy : What does it look like ? 

Mother : Something like a shell, and it is 
a pretty, pale pink color. I suppose it was made 
this shape so it can catch and hold sound ; for 

^ ''Something like 

I have seen some people living in old houses ^ ^^'^^^•" 
put up their hand to make the porch larger so they could 

hear better. 

(151) 




152 The House We Live In. 

Percy : I have often seen grandfather do that, but 
I never knew why before. 

Mother : Each sound finds a little door, which always 
stands open, and, though it is very small, the sound finds no 
trouble to get inside. This part of the passage is covered 
with sticky yellow wax, which is there to keep out anything 
which should try to go in except different kinds of sounds. 
Elmer: How lo.ng is the passage? 
Mother: Only about an inch, and it seems quite like 
a tunnel dug in a rock, only this is made in bone instead 
of stone. At the end there is a round curtain, which is 
drawn close and tight, like the head of a drum, so nothing 
but sound can get through. 

Percy : But what I would like to know is how the 
sound can get inside. 

Mother: Oh, there is nothing hard about that! It 
may seem quite like a fairy story, but all it has to do 
is to knock, and then it is on the other side. 

^^.^ Helen: How strange! And what does 

it find there? 

Mother : Things you would never expect 

to see, I am sure: First, a hammer, that 

strikes with its handle end on the curtain, 

_ or ear-drum, as soon as sound gives a 

knock, and with the other end it strikes 

a little anvil, and the anvil kicks against a tiny stirrup. 

Here is a picture of them. They are all made of bone. 

Elmer: Well, this beats anything we have heard yet. 

Mother : I don't wonder you say so; for the wisest 




The Hearing Passage. 153 

men, who have studied the body-house for years, say the 
ear is one of the most wonderful parts of the body. 
When boys or girls have two drums, two hammers, two 
anvils, and two stirrups in their heads, it is no wonder 
that it takes plenty of noise to make them happy. 

It makes me think of two little fellows I saw playing 
with a toy engine a few days ago. They had their 
mother's knitting-needles in the smoke-stack, and as they 
dragged the toy over the floor, it made a fine jingle. The 
mother, however, wished to talk with a lady friend, and 
asked them to take out the needles, so they would not 
disturb her. '* But it won't make any n-o-i-s-e then," said 
the older boy in a whining tone. I suppose the noise was 
a delight to all the tiny hammers and anvils in his ears ; 
and it is much the same with every boy. 

But I forgot to tell you that there is a way to reach 
the inside of the ear without going through the ear-drum. 

Amy: Please tell us how. 

Mother: By going the same way that air takes to go 
to the lungs; you will find a little door just before you 
come to the music room, which leads to the ear. 

Percy: But why should there be two passages to get 
to the inside.'^ 

Mother: For the very good reason that air is so 
heavy; if it should press against the ear-drum, it would 
break it, unless there was something to press just as much 
against the other side. So some nice, warm air goes up 
from the throat, and as it is just as heavy as the air out- 
side, it makes the weight alike on both sides. 



154 



The House We Live In. 



Drum of 




SMI Tuba 



Throat pA5s^§o 



I once heard of a girl who was asked how air could 
get inside of the drum of the ear, and she said, "Through 
the other ear." Her mates in school all laughed at such 
a thoughtless answer. You will now know better than 
to make such a statement if the question were asked you. 
Percy: But I would like to know what else a sound 
finds in the ear besides hammers, anvils, and stirrups. 

Mother: I think you can 
bbon Loops understand what I say better 
if you look closely at this pic- 
ture. This is very much larger 
than the ear inside your own 
head. You will see that there 
are tiny tunnels running every 
way, some shaped like loops, and one of them very much 
like the inside of a shell which winds round and round. 
Helen: And are all these little tunnels empty? 
Mother: No; they are filled with clear water. If 
you had a very strong mi'cro-scope you would see some 
things in the ear which would fill you with wonder. First 
of all we find a litde bag floating in the water, made of 
fine skin, that just fits into all the loops and tunnels. 
What do you suppose is in this tiny bag ? 

Amy: I'm sure I don't know. Please tell us. 
Mother: It is full of water, too, but it takes only a 
drop to fill it. Though this dainty bag is so small, yet 
there is room for some little stones in it, which we will call 
ear-stones. The picture shows the road sound travels, only 
this is much larger than the ear really is. 



The Hearing Passage. 155 

Percy: I should think it would get lost before it finds 
the end of all these winding passages. 

Mother: It has no trouble in finding its way, and find- 
ing it quickly, too. Suppose we start now from the out- 
side porch again, so you will not forget the road. First, 
it goes through the ear passage and knocks against the 
ear-drum. This makes the handle inside strike the drum, 
and the other end hits the anvil ; the anvil makes the 
stirrup tremble; and as sound passes along, that makes the 
water with the little ear-stones in it tremble also. 

Elmer : But what I want to know is how the sound 
gets into the brain so the master knows what it has to 
tell him. I don't see any use of its going through all 
those tunnels and staying there. 

Mother : You may be sure it does not stay there 
unless there is something wrong with the ear. One of the 
wires from your telephone system, which you call nerves, 
passes through a little hole in the skull, and it spreads out 
on the inside of the tunnels, and all sounds are carried by 
these nerves into the brain. As soon as one goes in, the 
master knows what kind of sound it is. 

Amy: I don't see why it should go through so many 
tunnels. 

Mother: I suppose He that formed the ear knows 
why, but I don't. A very high sound goes through the 
shell tube. A very loud sound travels through the loops. 

Helen: I suppose sweet sounds please the master of 
the house most, such as good music. 

Mother: Yes; he does not often like loud, harsh 



156 The House We Live In. 

sounds. Pleasant tones please him so much that he will 
sometimes sit for hours listening to them. People talk 
much about the in'stru-ments of music they have made; 
but they are nothing- when compared with the in'stru-ment 
God made for hearing them. 

This shows us that we should be very careful of our 
ears, that they may not be injured and we lose our hearing. 
We should never strike a child on the head or ears; for 
it may make him deaf. I know a young man whose grand- 
father ** boxed his ears " when he was a little child, and 
from that time he began to lose his hearing. When we 
think what the world would be to us if we were not able 
to hear the songs of the birds, the voices of those we 
love, and all the other sounds which give us pleasure, it 
should cause us to guard our ears from the slightest injury. 





SOME 

WONDERFUL 

WliNDOWS 



MOTHER: I told you some 
^ -^ time ago that the body- 
house has two windows through 
which the master looks at what 
is going on around him; for he 
never goes outside as long as he lives. 

Helen: Oh, I remember! Those are the eyes. 
Mother: Yes; and you may be sure that the One who 
made the house did not forget to make it to enjoy the light. 
The Bible says, "The light of the body is the eye." Most 
dwelling-houses have quite a number of windows, but 
though ours has but two, they are so made and placed in 
such a way that the master can see in every 
direction. Of what shape is the eye? 

Amy: It is nearly round, like a ball. av^ 

Mother: Now see how many ways you 
can look without moving your head. 

Elmer: Up and down, to either side, and in a circle. 
Mother: And by turning the body we can look any way 
we please. There is a fly which is said to have twenty-five 
thousand eyes, but even with so many it can not see more 
than we can with two, if we turn the head. Another thing 
which shows the wisdom of our heavenly Father is the 

(157) 




58 



The House We Live In. 



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um^mn^sni^mu 




It would not be well to have 
eyes shaped like these. 



position of our eyes. How strange it 
would seem if they were in the palms of 
our hands, or in the side or back of 
the head, or any other place in the body 
than just where they are ! 

Percy: Just think of it! Why, they 
would get hurt, and how strange we 
would look ! 

Mother: But we can see only the 
front part of the eye. Why would it 
not be as well to have eyes shaped like 
these? 

Percy: We could not roll them every 
way, as we can now, and they would 
not look well. 

Mother : Then you think they have 
the very best shape they could have. I 
think so, too. Now you may each feel 
around your eyes and tell what you find. 

Amy: There is hard bone all around 
them. 

Helen: They seem to be in a hol- 
low place in the skull. 

Mother: Yes; and this hollow place 
is called a socket. They are placed this 
way to protect them from harm, as we 
would place precious jewels in a strong 
casket. The eye, like a round ball, fills 
the socket or cave in which it lives 



Some Wonderful Windows. 159 

and moves, and behind and around it is a soft cushion 
of fat. 

Elmer : A ball hit my eye to-day, and it just seemed 
to go in, so it didn't hurt much. This must be because it 
was resting on such a soft cushion. 

Mother: And we see how the eyes are kept from 
in'ju-ry, too, by the little porches, or eyebrows, above. The 
stiff hairs, like a hairy arch, keep the sweat from running 
into them, and they also add beauty to the face. Then 
there is a pair of curtains for each one. 

Amy: I know what they are, — the eyelids. 

Mother: And like a double . curtain, or shutter, ihey 
close to keep the eyes from harm whenever danger is near. 
Quick as thought they shut tightly together; and each one 
has a hairy fringe to keep out dust or other objects hurtful 
to the eyes. Each of these curtains, or awnings, is placed 
in charge of two servant muscles, one to raise, the other to 
lower it, and they play up and down without noise or a 
hitch anywhere. 

Helen: And when we go to sleep, they softly close the 
window until we wake again. 

Mother: These windows in our house 
also wash and keep themselves clean. There 
is a tiny factory above the eye, where tears 
are made. Perhaps you have often wondered 
where tears came from, and now you know. As the eye- 
lids move up and down, the tears keep running over the 
eye, which makes it move so easily in the socket that it 
does not ache or wear out, and they keep it clean and 




i6o 



The House We Live In. 



bright. There is a little drain-pipe opening on the inner 
side of each lower eyelid, which carries away the tears into 

the nose after 



they are used. 
If we are sad 
or unhappy, 
sometimes so 
many tears 
are made that 
they can not 
pass through 
these drains, 
and then they 
run over the 
eyelids down 
the cheeks. 
There are al- 
so some little 
factories in 
the eyelids 
which make 
an oil for the 
edges of the 
lids, so they 
will not stick 
together, and 




This little boy's tears have "co?ne unfastened.'''' 



to keep the tears from running over the face. 

Percy: I never knew before where the tears came from, 
and that they were being made and used all the time. 



Some Wonderful Windows. i6i 

Helen: Nor I. Not long ago I read about a little girl 
named Margie who never cried when any small mishap 
came to her. But one day her best-loved dolly fell and 
got a dreadful bruise on her nose. Margie winked hard a 
few minutes, and then buried her face in her mother's lap, 
sobbing, "O mama, I don't want to cry, but all my tears 
have come unfastened!'' 

Mother: Poor child! she was nearer the truth than 
she thought ; and no doubt many folks, big and little, would 
be glad sometimes if they could keep their tears fastened 
up better. Have you ever thought why your 
eyes do not fall out when you bend over.-^ 

Amy: They must be fastened in tight. 

Mother : That is true ; for they are 
held by six little muscles, whose work it is ^^^^^iy li 

to keep them in place and move them about. "^^^"^ ^ ^ ^ ^^^' 

Elmer: But what is inside of the eye, mother? 

Mother : Let us look at the outside a little longer 
before we talk of the inside. Because the colored part of 
the eye is round, it is called the eyeball. It is with this 
part we see. The white part of the eye is filled with a 
clear substance, quite like jelly, and it has several strong 
coats or coverings outside. What part of the eye do you 
think we see through.'^ 

Helen : The black spot in the center. 

Mother : What is it called } 

Percy: The pupil. 

Mother: Now look into each other's eyes. What do 
you see around the pupil? 




1 62 The House We Live In. 

Elmer : There is a blue ring in Amy's eyes. 

Mother: This is called the iris, which means a rain- 
bow. You know we all like to see pretty curtains hung 
before windows, and such beautiful curtains you never saw 
as these in the eye. They are only half an inch wide, 
but they open or draw together around the pupil so the 
eye has just the right amount of light. When you are 
where it is very light, this wee round curtain draws up 
very small. If you are in a dark room, it opens wide, so 
the eye can have all the light there is. Sometimes these 
curtains are brown, gray, or blue, just the color which will 
match the outside of the house best. 

Amy: But won't you please tell us, mother, how we see 
with our eyes. 

Mother: I will try, and perhaps we 

can find out some things about it. Here 

(5o«cV^)!^^^^^^\^ = ^^ ^ picture which may help us. You 

see the front of the eye bulges out like 
a watch crystal, and it has a strong, glassy covering, called 
the cornea, which lets the light through. Passing through 
the pupil we come to the lens, which is shaped as you see 
in the picture. You have seen old persons wear spec'ta-cles 
to help them see. The glasses in the frames are lenses ; 
but you must not think from this that the lens in your 
eye is made of glass. It is because of the shape that it is 
called a lens. A picture of people, houses, trees, or any- 
thing else you look at, is made by the lens on the inner 
part of the eye, which is called the ret'i-na. It is almost 
wholly made up of the little branches of the nerve of sight. 




Some Wonderful Windows. 163 

Helen: And is that the way we see? 

Mother: Partly. The picture passes through the clear, 
jelly-like substance of the eye to the back, where it is 
spread out, and the nerves of sight carry it into the brain, 
for the master to see. We may have perfect eyes, but if 
anything is wrong with the eye nerve, we can not see; so 
we really see and hear with our brain instead of our eyes 
and ears. 

Elmer: Isn't the eye something like the camera used 
to take photographs ? 

Mother: Yes, in some ways. One curious thing about 
it is that it turns its pictures upside down before they 
strike the nerves of sight, and in this 
it is like the camera. 

Helen: I am so glad that we 

Pictures upside down. 

all have good eyes. 

Mother: And well you may be. We should always 
take the very best care of our eyes. Alcohol makes them 
red and bloodshot; for it makes too much blood go into 
them, just as it does all over the surface of the body. 
Tobacco injures them by making the nerves weak. It is 
a dreadful thing to be blind or have weak sight, and while 
we prize our eyes we will never take such poisons to 
injure them. 

Percy: I wish I could get a peep at the master when 
he looks through the windows. 

Mother: You may at any time. We know just how 
he feels by the "look" of his eyes. When he is displeased 
and angry, they look so hard that it almost seems as 




164 The House We Live In. 

though sparks flew from them. When he is pleased, they 
light up with kindness and pleasure, and you wish to be 
near him, he seems so happy, and it makes you glad, too. 
When he is loving and kind, there is such a tender feeling 
shines through that it seems like a warm, comforting fire, 
and you love him better than ever before. So the eyes 
** speak," though they never say a word. 

MY TWO WINDOWS. 

"Two wonderful windows 
The Lord gave me ; 
And through these windows 
His wonders I see. 

"The beautiful flo\^ers, 

The grass and the trees, 
The hills and the valleys, 
The birds and the bees, 

"The faces of parents 
So dear to me, 
The stars in the sky. 
The fish in the sea, — 

"All these through my windows 
Most gladly I see, 
And praise my Creator 
For giving them me." 

— CM. Snow. 





OTHER: A little boy 
was once asked to repeat 
his Bible verse, and he 
said, " I don't remember just 
what the words are, but it is 
the one where Paul said he kept 
his soul on topT 

Elmer: I think this must 
have been the one he meant, 
"But I keep under my body, 
and bring it into sub-jec'tion." 

Mother : Yes, and the child 
no doubt thought if his body 
was ''under,'' his soul must be 
''on top'' I think it means that 
the mind should be the master 
of the body, doing only that 
which will be for its good. The 
master, when he knows what is 

(165) 



1 66 



The House We Live In. 



best, will not let one of his servants be master instead of 
himself. 

Helen: I should think every one would want to do 
what is best to keep the body well. 

.Mother: We would all think so, but there is one of 
the servants who often gets control 
of the master and coaxes him till he 
gets his own way. But, though he 
may be a good servant, he is a very 
bad master, and the body has a sorry 
time when this servant has his own 
way. 

Amy: What is the servant's name? 

Mother: He is called Taste. His 

room is the passage where we found 

so many servants dressed in white. 

He wears a pink dress, and stays in 

the house most of the time, but once 

in a while he peeps out between the 

folding doors. 

Amy: That is the tongue, I know. 

Mother: Yes, that is where we find Taste at home. 

Sometimes when he has his own way, his dress becomes a 

dirty yellow or brown color, and if the master finds himself 

quite ill, he sends for a doctor, who comes, and about the 

first thing he does is to ask the tongue to step outside a 

moment, and as soon as the wise man looks at its dress, 

he knows whether Taste has been doing his duty or not. 

Percy: But what is his duty? 




The tongue. 



A Good Servant. 167 

Mother: To tell the master what is good to build and 
mend the body, and to help him enjoy his food. If some 
good whole-wheat bread, oatmeal, or some fresh fruit passes 
the guards, Taste rolls it over and over and sends word to 
the master through some of the little telephone wires: "This 
is very good. I think we will have more of this." Then 
the servants in the kitchen are pleased, and all goes well. 
You have heard that 

' ' Little Jack Horner sat In a corner, 
Eating a Christmas pie," 

but 1 have read of another boy, who bore the same name, 
and this is what is said of him : — 

' ' Little Jack Horner 

Sat in a corner, 

Eating a morsel of nice brown-bread. 
' Have some pie or some cake ? ' 
'Nay, not I,' with a shake 

And a toss of his wise little head; 
'For this bread will make bone. 

And teeth white as a stone, 

That neither grow soft nor decay; 

But rich cake and rich pie 

Sure will break by and by 

My good health, and that never will pay. ' ' ' 

Helen: But does Taste not ask for more than the 
body needs sometimes ? 

Mother: Yes, very often; and that is one of the times 
when he needs a firm master. At other times he gets in 
such a hurry that he lets the food go down to the kitchen 
before it is half ready. 



1 68 



The House We Live In. 




THEREFORE 
YE EAT OR 
DRINK OR 
WHATSO- 
EVER YE 
DO, DO ALL 
TO THE 
GLORY OF 

% GOD. I COR 10 31 




Elmer: But does Taste ever want 
things which are not good for the body ? 

Mother : Yes, many, many times. 
He coaxes so hard that I have seen some 
boys and girls even cry for that which 
would make them ill. If given a good 
piece of bread, they wanted pie or cake 
or some other hurtful thing. One thing 
I must tell you about Taste: If he has 
nothing at all given him when he gets 
the sulks, after a while he is very well 
pleased to get even plain food, and as he 
rolls it over and over, he says by his 
actions, "It tastes much better than I 
thought it did." 

Amy : A lady once asked me if I had 
a sugar tooth, mother. What did she 
mean? 

Mother: When one's taste calls for 
a great many sweet things, people some- 
times say of such a person that they have 
a "sugar tooth," but it is Taste, and not 
the teeth, who wants to be pleased that 
way. Candies, lollies, and sweet foods are 
bad for the teeth as well as the stomach; 
but Taste often begs for them, even 
though they do harm in the body. He 
sometimes learns to like what he dislikes 
very much at first, so you see it is the 



A Good Servant. 



69 



master's duty to give him only that which 
he knows is best. 

He often does great harm by asking 
the master for things to taste when the 
kitchen is full and the cook does not wish 
to be disturbed in her work. Really I 
think you will agree with me that he is 
a very selfish fellow, and cares more for 
his own pleasure than for the comfort of 
others or the welfare of his master. If 
he has his own way, it makes the master 
cross, and everything seems to go wrong. 

Helen: I shall try to teach my Taste 
to call for only those things that will 
make my body well. 

Mother: If you do, you will some- 
times have a quarrel with him, but all 
the other servants will be glad that you 
do not let him master you. That is one 
way the Bible means we should keep our 
bodies under. Sometimes we have to take 
Taste by the throat, as it were, and when 
we have him down, let him know that 
we are his master, and that we intend to 
rule our own house. 

Percy: Isn't that the way people do 
when they leave off drinking wine and 
beer, and stop using tobacco ? 

Mother: Yes; and sometimes they 



Blessed 

ART THOU 
LAMD, 
WHEN THY 
KlhQlSTHE 
son OF 
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THY PRinCES 
EAT IN DUE 
5E/\50N,F0R 
STRENGTH, 
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FOR DRUMK- 
ENNE35. 

ECC, 10:17. 



170 The House We Live In. 

have a terrible fight with Taste before they convince him 
that they intend to be master. Sometimes he gets them 
down, and again they put him under; many have fought 
the battle for weeks, it may be for months, night and 
day, and at last Taste gives up and the master wins. 

Helen: Wouldn't it be better if they did not let him 
have his own way at first ? 

Mother: Surely it would. That is why I wish you, 
while children, to train your Taste, or appetite, so he will 
only call for the things which are best for your bodies, and 
so you will form no bad habits of eating and drinking. 
Then you will not have the battles of which we have been 
speaking; for, as I have said, Taste is a good servant. All 
he needs is to be taught that he must keep his proper 
place, and that he is not to rule the house. If boys and 
girls begin to eat between meals; if their Taste calls for 
rich food and sweetmeats; if they want spices, pepper, 
mustard, and hot sauces with their food, they are letting 
Taste become their master, and it will be easy for them to 
begin to use cigarettes and to drink beer. When they 
open the gate for Taste to become master, they know not 
where they will end. They have entered the path to death 
and ruin. 

Elmer: I should think that this servant has more power 
to do harm than any of the others. 

Mother : He has. Next to the master himself, he 
holds the most important position of all. Not only does 
Taste live in the tongue, but It is with the tongue that we 
talk. It Is such an unruly fellow that it is fastened to the 



A Good Servant, 



171 




floor so that it can not get away; there are strong walls 
all around it; a double row of servants stand in front to 
guard it; and the double doors are made to shut closely, 

to keep out anything that should not 
go in, and to keep back anything that 
should not come out. Yet for all that 
it is so unruly that it often puts the 
master to shame, and wounds his best 
friends. The Bible says that if any 
one can control the tongue, which 
means, I suppose, their taste and talk, 
he can govern his whole body. 

Amy: Who would think that such 
a little fellow could do so much harm ! 
Mother: Little things may do 
much good or evil. A bridle is a 
small thing, yet the bits turn the horse any way we wish 
him to go. I was once on a great ship at sea. There 
was a fearful storm. In the ship there was a little helm, 
which turned it any way the captain wished it to go. So 
it is with the tongue; life and death 
are in its power. 

Percy : But isn't it a good thing 
to taste and talk, mother ? 

Mother: Yes, indeed. 
Animals can taste, but they 
can not talk, or laugh. This 
is one thing that makes us of 
a higher order of beings than 



A ^real ship at seei: 




172 The House We Live In. 

they. What a blessing kind, gentle words are! How thank- 
ful we should be for a keen Taste, which helps us to enjoy 
our food ! On the other hand, what pain and sorrow come 
when angry words are spoken, and how much sickness and 
death are the result of letting Taste have his own way ! 
What we want is that the master of the body-house should 
keep this servant as with a bit and bridle ; for he will obey 
if he must. 

Helen : I shall be more careful of my tongue after this. 

Mother: But the Bible says again, "The tongue can 
no man tame." We can never master it in our own 
strength. We must ask God to help us; for we can never 
control our Taste or our talk without His aid. 




MY : Here are some violets for you, mother. 
I just gathered them in the garden. See how 
fragrant they are. 
Mother: They are indeed, and I thank 
the little girl who was so kind and thoughtful. Did you 
ever think of the sense which makes us enjoy the flowers 
and all pleasant perfumes? 

Amy: Why, yes; we smell them, do we not? 

Mother: Yes; and now let us see if we can learn a 
few things about this sense which gives us so much 
pleasure. You may each take a few of these violets. 
How shall we find out where Smell lives? 

Percy: He must be in the nose. 

Mother : I suppose you think so because you do not 
put the violets to your ears, eyes, or mouth to enjoy their 
odor, but hold them near your nose. Now hold them 
quite close to it and breathe out. 

Elmer: But we can't smell anything when we do that 
way. 

Mother: No; then when we enjoy the sweet flowers, 
we place them near the nostrils and draw a deep breath, 
and we say, "Ah, how sweet!" We do this so that more 
air will touch the nerves of Smell, which are in the uppe** 

(173) 



174 



The House We Live In, 



part of the nose. These little nerves form the tiniest 
branches you can think of, and all unite in one large nerve, 
which goes to the brain. They quickly tell us about things 
we can neither taste nor see. They are thickly spread 
over this room of Smell, which is Indeed a wonderful 

place. Here is a picture of the 
nerves of which I have been 
telling you. 

Percy: I think in a dog Smell 
must have good nerves. 

Mother: Yes; for some dogs 
will follow the footsteps of their 
master, though he has been out 
of sight for hours, and Smell is 
so keen that they use him in track- 
ing game while hunting. Some Indians in South America 
can tell if a stranger comes near them, even in a dark 
night, by the use of Smell alone. They can also tell if 
a stranger is black or white. In some people Smell is 
much keener than in others. 

Elmer : When I had a cold last week, I couldn't smell 
at all. 

Mother : Sometimes when one has a very bad cold, 
the opening Into Smell's room gets filled up so that odors 
can not get in. People having a disease called ca-tarrh' 
often can not smell at all. 

Helen: But of what use is Smell to us? 
Mother : First, he helps us to eat proper food. We 
are not apt to eat anything which has a bad odor ; at least 




A Faithful Watchman. 



175 



Smell might be said to be a twin 



we should not do so 

brother to Taste, and part of his duty is to help Taste in 

selecting proper food for the body. Sometimes when 




Dogs will follow the footsteps of their master.' 



dinner is cooking, I liear you say: ^'Oh, how good it 
smells! It makes me feel hungry." 

Percy: I have often felt that way, but I didn't know 
it was Smell giving me an invitation to eat. 

Mother: Another way Smell cares for the body is by 
giving us warning against bad air. Sometimes a lot of 
tiny folk called **germs" get into the air and make it unfit 
to wash the blood. These germs are ''seeds of sickness," 
and should never be allowed to get inside the body. 
Sometimes they make the air smell bad, and then Smell 



176 The House We Live In. 

sends word to the brain: "Look out! Don't come here; 
for this bad air will make you ill." 

Amy: And does that mean that the master should take 
the body away ? 

Mother: Yes; or if we go into a room which is close 
and musty, and the air is full of germs, it means to open 
the doors and windows, and let the clean, pure air come 
in. Sometimes Smell gets so used to bad odors that he 
does not give warning as he should; so we should always 
heed his counsel at first. Any place or thing which has 
bad odors should never be near the house. 

Helen : I think Smell must find some sleeping-rooms 
rather unpleasant places for him to stay in. 

Mother: He cer'tain-ly does. Sometimes he gives the 
one who sleeps in such rooms quite a scolding. After he 
has been out in the fresh air, and comes back into the 
room, I im-ag'ine I hear him talking something like this: 
"Don't you know it is a dreadful thing for you to breathe 
air like this .-^ How would you like to drink the water 
your face or your clothes had been washed in ? But you 
have done worse than that : you have kept washing your 
blood in the same air, over and over again, all-night. It is 
no w^onder that you have a headache and feel all tired out 
this morning. Now open the windows, and give this room 
a good airing, and if you sleep here another night, see that 
there are places where the good air can come in and the bad 
air go out, and I promise you I will not talk like this again." 

Percy: If the master of the house knew no better than 
that, he ought to have a lecture. 



A Faithful Watchman. 177 

Mother : I think so, too. When air costs nothing, 
and comes whistling around every corner, begging to come 
in, we should never go without a good supply. There is 
one more way in which Smell is useful to us. 

Elmer: How is that.'* 

Mother: It gives us pleasure. When God made us, 
He desired that we should be happy; so He gave us eyes 
to see the beautiful things He has made, ears to hear the 
music of the birds, taste to enjoy the fine flavors He 
placed in our foods, and smell to breathe in the fragrance 
of the violet and the rose. We ought to be very thankful 
for all these senses, which make us happy. 




A GENTLE NURSE 



OTHER: You remember I told you 
that the body-house is all the time wear- 
ing out. Every time we think, move, 
play, or work, some part becomes worn, 
and must be mended. Blood, the care-taker, 
passes swiftly around every part, first up, 
then down ; and every trip she makes, the bones take 
something to mend them ; the flesh takes its part ; the skin 
must have a share; the hair and finger-nails take some- 
thing to make them grow ; and so, while we study, work, 
or play, the mending goes on, and we hardly stop to think 
that it is done at all. 

Helen: This seems to me one of the most wonderful 
things about the body. 

Mother: But there is another wonderful thing of 
which we have not yet spoken. When we are tired with 
the work of the day, and the sun goes down in the west, 
a gentle nurse steps in and says to the master of the 
body-house: ** Please give me the care of your house 
awhile. I will rest you, and while I have you in charge 
Blood can do her work better, and in a few hours you 
will feel as good as new." 

Amy: And does the master do as she says .'^ 
Mother: Sometimes he is not willing at first, but at 
last he is glad to hand everything over to her. Then she 
(178) 



A Gentle Nurse, 



179 



quietly draws the curtains down over the windows, shuts 

the doors in the hearing passages, and the muscles of the 

arms and legs stop their 

work, the engine slows 

down, air goes into the 

bath room more slowly, 

all becomes quiet in the 

body-house, and the first 

thing the master knows 

he knows nothing at all. 

Elmer : How strange 
to think that way of going 
to sleep ! 

Amy: Is Sleep the 
nurse, mother? 

Mother: Yes, Amy; 
and a better one never 
lived. Sometimes when 
the house is all out of 
order, and the father and 
mother watch over some 
little body moaning with pain 

and tossing with fever, Sleep comes in and gives the dear 
child a long, sweet rest, and the good doctor says : ** I am 
so glad! She will get better now." He knows that if he 
can get Sleep to nurse his sick people, they will all "do 
well." She is so kind that she comes of herself, takes us 
in her arms, comforts us, and when we are quite rested, 
she leaves us to do as we will till she is needed again. 








Gentle sleep 



i8o 



The House We Live In. 



She never asks pay for her services, and the most skilful 
nurse never had such success as she in taking away care 
and worry, and in building up the house we live in. 
Percy: But why must we sleep, mother? 
Mother: Because when we are awake, the body wears 
out faster than Blood can mend it, but if we go to sleep, 
she can mend faster than it wears out. We need sleep 
as much, and I sometimes think more, than we need food 
and drink. When we feel tired and drowsy, that is the 
call of the nurse for us to give ourselves into her care. 

Amy: Should we sleep in the daytime.-^ 
^ Mother: Very young children should; for their body- 
houses are building fast, and so they 
need much sleep. Very old people 
sometimes need sleep in the daytime, 
because their houses are wearing out 
fast; but, as a rule, we should sleep 
during the night, and keep awake 
during the day. 

Elmer: How long should we sleep .^^ 
Mother : Some need more than 
others do. Grown people need seven 
or eight hours' and children should 
have still more. When we wake up, 
we should get up. The Duke of Wel- 
lington once said, "When it's time to 
turn over, it's time to turn out." 

Helen : How can we get to sleep 
if wakeful when we go to bed ? 



Good-night, 




A Gentle Nurse. l8i 

Mother: Those who can not sleep well should spend 
much time out-of-doors during the day. One should not 
eat for several hours before going to bed; for if the stom- 
ach must work, it often keeps the rest of the body awake. 
Every one should have a clean bed, and sleep where he 
can have plenty of pure air. To work till one is tired, if 
not carried too far, will also help. But, even though a 
person does all these things, if he tries to sleep when the 
mind is worried or excited, the gentle nurse will not come. 
One of the best helpers to sound sleep is a clear con- 
science, and the knowledge that one has done his best in 
everything. 

Helen: I heard a lady say that she drank a cup of 
tea and it kept her awake half the night. 

Mother: It often has this effect. If one has not been 
using it, this is more apt to be the case, and this shows 
that tea contains poison, and that it is not good for the 
body. When a person can not sleep, he should know that 
danger is near. The master of the house we live in must 
have rest. Sweet sleep is the best rest for a tired brain; 
for while Sleep has charge of the body, she cleans the 
brain and makes it bright and ready to do more work. 
If it does not get rest, it becomes ill, and sometimes 
people lose the right use of the mind; then we say they 
are insane, or crazy. That means that they do not know 
what they are doing. They may try to kill themselves or 
other people, and they must be locked up in strong rooms, 
so they can not get away and do themselves or others 
harm. Sometimes they get well, but many live for years 



1 82 The Ho2ise We Live In. 

in this sad con-di'tion. It often comes because people 
injure their brains with strong drink. 

Percy: Do not people who sell such drinks often stay- 
up late at night ? 

Mother: I think they nearly always do. The people 
who are at the saloons should be in their beds, letting 
their brains and bodies rest. When at last they go to 
bed, the brain is stupid because of the strong drink they 
have taken. They lie in bed long after the sun is up, 
and when they rise, they feel worn out instead of rested. 
The poor brain bears such treatment for a time, but at 
last reason is gone, and the person is ruined for life. 

Elmer: What a shame! I know one lad who will 
never go where beer and whisky are sold, and who will 
have his sleep at night if he can get it. 

Percy : And I know another. 

Mother: I trust that my boys will never do anything 
to hurt the brain and drive sleep away. 

"Go to bed early — wake up with joy; 
Go to bed late — cross girl or boy. 
Go to bed early — ready for play; 
Go to bed late — moping all day. 
Go to bed early — no pains or ills; 
Go to bed late — doctors and pills." 

—St. Nicholas. 



A WICKED THIEF 





MOTHER: You know all houses are In danorer 
from thieves. When no one is watching, in 
the dark night, they come and steal our 
money and the most precious things we 
have. There is also a bold thief who takes 
delight in robbing the body-house. 
Elmer: But who can it be.'^ I'm sure no one would 
want to steal me. 
Amy: Nor me. 

Mother: You know thieves always try to find some 
way to get into a house when they wish to steal, and 
this robber is just like the rest. It is a little over three 
hundred years old, and it grows more bold and cunning 
every year. 

Percy: Please tell us its name, mother. 
Mother: It is called Tobacco. It was first found in 
America when the country was discovered, but it did not 
begin to steal from white men for nearly one hundred years. 
Sir Walter Raleigh, of whom you will learn in your history, 
took it from America to England. It is said that Sir 
Walter one day sent his servant for some beer, and he 

(183) 



i84 



The House We Live In. 



came back sooner than was expected. He was greatly 
frightened to see smoke coming out of the mouth and 
nose of his master, and at once threw the beer into his 

face to put the fire out, calHng 
loudly for help, and saying that 
his master was on fire inside, and 
would surely burn up. 

Helen: It is a pity there are 
not more such servants now, for 
they might cure some people of 
this filthy habit. 

Elmer: But why do you call 
tobacco a thief, mother '^ 

Mother: Because it steals. 
Percy: But what does it 
steal ? I thought people just 
chewed, smoked, and snuffed it, 
and I can not see how that is 
stealing. 

Mother: It steals health. Its first efTect Is to cause sick- 
ness and vomiting. Every servant in the body-house rises 
up in arms against it, and there is a great uproar as they 
try to defend their master from the deadly poison. The 
servants in the kitchen throw all there is in that room out 
at the front door. The lungs throw It out headlong in the 
breath. All the little waste-pipes in the skin work as hard 
as ever they can to push it out that way. The kidneys, 
bowels, and. In fact, every servant In the house, shows It 
the door, and will not let It stay inside If he can help It 




Tobacco. 



A Wicked Thief. 185 

Elmer: But can't the master keep it out? 

Mother: Yes, if he would. That is the trouble. But 
tobacco pretends to be such a good friend, and makes so 
many good promises, that the master believes its lies, and 
lets it in. Boys think they are almost men if they can 
only smoke cigarettes. Some men say '*a good smoke" 
rests them when they feel tired. Others say they must 
have it **to keep their food down." Many smoke or chew 
because others do. And so tobacco deceives them all. 

Percy: But doesn't tobacco do some good, mother? 

Mother: I have never heard of it if it does. The 
nicotin of tobacco is such a deadly poison that one drop 
will kill a cat in about three minutes. It does not take a 
large amount to kill a man in five minutes. If a tea is 
made from it, it will cause death in three hours. Some- 
times soldiers who do not wish to do their duty will put 
a leaf of tobacco under the arm or over the stomach to 
make them sick. 

Amy : I should think if it is such a poison it would 
kill people to use it. 

Mother: It would if they took enough of it. You 
know arsenic is a deadly poison, yet some people take it 
in small doses and live a long time. When the servants 
of the body-house find that their master will use it whether 
it hurts them or not, they give up making so much trouble 
as they did at first; but they still keep turning it out as 
quietly as they can, and say but little about it. 

Percy : But I heard an old man say he had used 
tobacco for fifty years, and it never did him any harm. 



1 86 The House We Live In. 

Mother: Perhaps he did not know how much it had 
harmed him. Alcohol does not seem to hurt some people, 
and yet we have learned that it works mischief in every 
part of the body; and it is the same with tobacco. If 
such men do not suffer themselves, their children often 
suffer in their stead. Because a few can use these poisons 
without seeming injury, it does not make it safe for 
others to do so. While we are learning how to care for 
the body, we should not ask, "Will this do me harm?^' 
but, "Will this habit do me diny good?'' Let us see what 
good tobacco does. 

Percy: It is good to kill sheep-ticks and plant-lice. 

Mother: That shows how deadly it is, and how unfit 
for any human being to use in his body. 

Helen: I do not think there are many persons who 
would say it does them good. 

Mother: We find that its first effect is to take away 
the appetite; and it hurts the stomach. Second, it does 
harm in the throat, making the voice coarse and husky, 
and men sometimes have a disease known as "smoker's sore 
throat." Third, it hurts the nerves, the wonderful telephone 
system; the tobacco-user is nervous, cross, and hard to please. 
Fourth, it weakens the eyes, and causes buzzing sounds in 
the ears. Fifth, it makes the heart weak, so a doctor can 
tell by feeling a man's pulse whether he uses tobacco or 
not. His hands become unsteady, and they tremble, and 
his heart trembles just as his hands do. 

Percy: I think that is enough, mother, to show that 
tobacco does no good, but a great deal of harm. 



A Wicked Thief. 187 

Mother: There is one more thing- I wish you to know 
about this poison, and that is that it makes the master of 
the house weak. He feels so happy and rested while he 
is taking his smoke, that he thinks surely tobacco does 
him good and not evil. But the reason he feels rested 
is because his nerves have been put to sleep by the poison. 
Our nerves are like a faithful watch-dog. The first thing 
tobacco does is to put the nerves to sleep, just as a thief 
would kill a dog that would warn its master of his 
coming. You can see, I think, what a foolish thing it is 
for a boy or man to do anything which would put the 
faithful nerves to sleep so they can not warn him of 
danger. 

Elmer : But, mother, do not the nerves wake up after 
a time? 

Mother: Indeed they do, and then if the man can 
not get his tobacco, you will see how unhappy he can be; 
all his good nature and rested feelings have passed away. 
He soon finds this out if he tries to leave off the poison. 
He feels ''all gone," and thinks that he must have some- 
thing to brace him up. He becomes thirsty, and so the 
temptation comes to use strong drink. A doctor who 
knows, has said, "Nine out of ten of the boys and young 
men who become drunkards, have first learned to smoke 
or chew tobacco." 

Tobacco makes that part of the mind which is called 
the "will" so weak that thousands who use it have no 
strength to resist the temptation to drink when it comes 
to them. Besides, the mind is so weakened that they 



I §8 The House We Live In. 

can not stop using tobacco even when they know it is 
hurtful to them, but they say — 

**For thy sake, tobacco, I 
Would do anything but die." 

And many even die because they have no strength to let 
it alone. Boys think it makes them manly to smoke and 
chew. Manly, indeed ! I wish I could speak to every 
boy in every land to whom tobacco comes, and tell them 
that if they wish to grow up clean, noble, unselfish, manly 
men, they will never taste tobacco. It does more to harm 
boys than men. One doctor has said, " Boys and young 
men who use tobacco lose one-fifth of the enjoyment and 
value, and at least one-tenth of the length of their lives." 

Percy: But cigarettes are not very bad, are they, 
mother? I know many of the boys in school smoke them. 

Mother: Bad! Indeed, they are very bad! They are 
made of the stumps of old cigars picked up in the streets, 
and from other vile, filthy things. Even the paper they 
are wrapped in, which seems so harmless, is steeped in 
deadly drugs, which makes them still worse. They are 
made and sold by millions, and thousands of boys are 
being ruined in mind and body because of using them. 
I often read in the papers of the death of some boy, 
caused by smoking cigarettes. I have no words to tell 
you the mischief they do; and yet thousands of people 
think them harmless. 

Amy: I wish Uncle John wouldn't kiss me, for he 
uses tobacco. 



A Wicked Thief. 189 

Helen: You are like the little girl it tells about in 
the verses I learned. I will repeat them for you: — 

* ' ' What ails papa, mother ? ' said a sweet little girl, 
Her bright laugh revealing her teeth white as pearl; 
' I love him and kiss him and sit on his knee, 
But tlie kisses don't smell good when he kisses me. 
But, mama' — her eyes opened wide as she spoke — 
' Do yo2i like his nasty kisses of ' bacco and smoke ? 
They might do for boys, but for ladies and girls 
I don't think them nice,' and she tossed her bright curls. 

* Don't somebody's papas have moufs nice and clean, 
With kisses like yours, mama — that's what I mean? 
I want to kiss papa, I love him so well, 

But kisses don't taste good that have such a smell. 
It's nasty to drink, and smoke 'bacco, and chew; 
The kisses ain't good and ain't sweet, ma, like you.' 
And her blossom-like face wore a look of disgust, 
As she gave out her verdict, so earnest and just. 

* Yes, yes, Httle darling, your wisdom has seen 

That kisses for daughters and wives should be clean; 

For kisses lose something of nectar and bliss 

From mouths that are stained and unfit for a kiss.'" 

Mother: Yes, I read this poem in the last number of 
the Prohibitionist, and I think every girl, big and little, 
should feel just as this one has expressed it. When 
Horace Mann was asked where gentlemen should smoke, 
he said, ''Gentlemen never smoke." Billy Bray said, ''If 
God had intended man to smoke, he would have put a 
chimney at the top of his head to let the smoke out." 

By giving up every bad habit we may help others to 
do the same. I must tell you a short story about a friend 
of mine who helped a young man stop using tobacco. 

Amy: Please tell it now, mother. 



190 The House We Live hi: 

Mother: She had often asked him not to use tobacco, 
but the habit was so strong that he felt that he could not 
give it up. At last he said one day : " I think you are 
as much a slave to tea as I am to tobacco. If you will 
stop drinking tea, I will use no more tobacco." That put 
the matter in a new light, and she told him she would 
think about it. She knew that tea contained a poison, and 
that it did her no real good, but only harm ; so she finally 
decided to drink it no more. When she next met her 
friend, she told him that she would use no more tea, and 
in a short time he left off using tobacco. 

Elmer: That must be what the Bible means when it 
says that we should "provoke one another to good works." 

Mother: Yes, that is one way. You know I said 
when we began talking that tobacco was a thief. I will 
now tell you of something it steals from the master of the 
house besides his health. 

Percy: I wonder if it is money. I know that is what 
thieves almost always try to get. 

Mother: You guessed it at once. Let us see how 
much this robber will take from a man if he once lets it 
into the house. One who is a very moderate smoker will 
spend about forty dollars a year for cigars. People in 
England would call that sum seven or eight pounds. Sup- 
pose a man should smoke thirty years. Here 
is an example for you. Amy. 

Amy: Twelve hundred dollars. How much 
would that be in English money .^ 

Mother: About two hundred and forty-six 




A Wicked Thief. 191 

pounds. That would buy him a nice little home, would it 
not? Or if he was a lover of books, he could get a good 
library for that sum. And you must remember that this 
is for a inoderate smoker. A merchant said that by saving 
the money he would have spent for cigars, he laid up 
twenty-nine thousand dollars, or nearly six thousand pounds. 
If he had spent it for tobacco, what would he have had 
for his money? _ 

Percy: Smoke. 

Amy : A dirty mouth and bad breath. 

Elmer: A weak heart and weak nerves. 

Helen: He might not have lived to smoke so long, 
and he might have been a drunkard. 

Mother: Not very much that is good, for spending 
such a large sum of money, I must say. 

Percy: I once heard grandmother say that when she 
saw a man with a lighted cigar, the thought came into her 
mind, "A fire at one end and a fool at the other." It 
does seem foolish to waste money that way, I wish I had 
some of it that goes up in smoke to send me to college 
when I am ready to go. 

Mother: Here is a picture which I think shows this 
matter in about the right light. 

Helen: Why, what are those people burning in that 
big fire? 

Mother: Money, money — nothing but money. Here 
is a rich man; he is throwing in one thousand dollars; 
and here is another, who is bringing one hundred pounds. 
Others are throwing in different sums, some less, some 



192 



The House We Live In, 



more. See how many young men there are who need 
that money for something else. 

Elmer: And see the workingmen, too. 




Mother: Yes; and 
many of them have no 
homes, and they wear poor 
clothes, and eat very plain 
food. They need many things. It 
may be the wife at home has not had 
a new dress for years, and the children 
have no shoes. 

Amy: And just see the little boys 
burning up their money, too ! 

Mother: How very sad! They ^re only 
children, and yet they throw away their pen- 
nies and dimes. What are all these people 
getting for their money? 



A Wicked Thief. 193 

Helen: Smoke — nothing but smoke. 

Mother: They get smoke, it is true, but they also get 
pains and aches. Tobacco laughs as it takes their money, 
and grows larger and stronger every day. 

Percy: But, mother, can nothing be done to stop their 
burning up money like that ? 

Mother: You think some one should call out, ''Stop, 
thief!" do you.-* Perhaps that was what King James, of 
England, thought; for when people began using it in that 
country, he wrote a book, in which he said that smoking 
was ** loathsome to the eye, hateful to the nose, harmful 
to the brain, and dangerous to the lungs." The Russian 
Government tried to put a stop to smoking by saying that 
if a person were caught using tobacco, his nose should be 
cut off. Perhaps it was thought that people who abuse 
smelling that way had no right to have a nose. The sul- 
tan of Turkey once put to death those who smoked, or 
used snuff. 

Percy: I should think such laws would have stopped 
its use in a little while. 

Mother: They did not; for people can not be made to 
do right in that way. They used it more than " they had 
before. I think the best way is for the master of every 
body-house to say, *'I will never, no, never, touch it; and 
I will do my best to let others know how hurtful it is, 
so they will not use it." Many, very many, do not know 
how much harm tobacco does in the body, nor what a sin- 
ful waste of money it causes. They spend it a few pen- 
nies at a time, and do not stop to think how much it 
13 



194 ^^^ House We Live In. 

amounts to in a year or a lifetime. More money is spent 
for tobacco than for bread. One hundred times as much 
money goes up in tobacco smoke as is given to missions. 
Let us do all that we can to prevent this waste. No bird 
or animal would ever be guilty of taking into its body any- 
*thing so harmful. 

MINNIE AND HER CANARY. 

Minnie's rebuke. 

"You were a naughty bird to-day; 
It shocked me, do you know, 
To see you fly from brother Frank, 
And pick at cousin Joe. 

"Now tell me why you acted so; 
There, don't begin to sing. 
But tell me why you were so rude, 
You saucy little thing!" 

THE bird's reply. 

* ' I had to leave your brother Frank, 
Or else to stay and choke; 
He had a nasty cigarette; 

I could not stand the smoke. 

"And with your cousin Joe — oh, dear! 
He put his mouth to mine, 
And, oh! I thought I'd faint away, 
For he'd been drinking wine. 

"The little birds don't do such things; 
No crow, or paroquet. 
Or other bird, would swallow wine 
Or smoke a cigarette." 







CRUEL 




MURDERER 




OTHER: Bad as it is to steal, it is worse to 
kill. Dreadful as it may seem, yet it is true 
that a murderer watches to get into the body- 
( Ml. house; and unless it is kept out, sooner or later 
t i:fc^ it will ruin the house and kill the master. It has 
#/h "^ different names, but the most common are Cider, 
Beer, Wine, Ale, Brandy, and Whisky; but its real name 
is Alcohol. I have some here in this bottle. 
Elmer: Why, it looks like clear water! 
Mother: So it does. Let us see if we can find out 
how it is different from water. I will pour a little into this 
saucer. Percy, you may light a match and hold close to it. 
Amy : Oh, it burns ! 
Mother: Will water burn.'^ 
Helen: No, water puts out fire. 

Mother: Here is a tester. I will pour a little whisky 
in it and boil it over this spirit lamp. Now the steam 
comes out. Percy, you may light a match and hold it 
close to the steam. 

Percy: Oh, see it burn! 

Mother: Will steam from the teakettle burn.'* 

Amy: No, mother. 

(195) 



196 



The House We Live In. 




Mother: So you see the American Indians gave it a 
very good name when they called it "fire-water." Another 
difference between water and alcohol is that water 
will freeze, but alcohol never freezes. I will show 
you one thing more. Here is some oil in this bottle. 
If I should pour in some water, would it mix with 
the oil? 

Percy: No; the oil would stay on top. 
Mother : But alcohol will mix with oil. 
Let us try again. Here is a fresh ^<g^ 
broken into a glass. If I should pour some 
water over it and stir them together, it would 
not change the looks of the ^gg. Instead of water, I will 
pour in some alcohol. Now watch the mixture as I stir 
them together. 

Elmer: Why, the ^<g<g looks as though it were cooked! 
It is getting hard. 

Mother: Yes, and if I should put a little piece of lean 
meat in alcohol, it also would become hard. Now the 
reason that the ^<gg or a piece of meat becomes hard is 
because alcohol has such a liking for water that it draws 
the water out, leaving the ^g<g or meat hard and dry. 
Alcohol does the very same thing in our bodies ; that is, 
it takes up the moisture in the nerves, muscles, and other 
parts; and I think that must be why it creates such a 
terrible thirst, which can not be satisfied. The poor man 
who drinks, thinks that he wants more alcohol, when it is 
really for water, water, that every part of his body is call- 
ing. I think you already see that alcohol is so different 



A Cruel Murderer. 



197 



from water, the drink that God made for man, that it was 
never intended that we should drink it. 

Percy: But how is alcohol made? 

Mother : Alcohol comes from death. Something must 
decay and die to produce it. We do not find it in wheat 
or any other grain. Peaches, plums, pears, apples, and 
grapes say, "It is not in me," yet it can be made from all 
of them. Do you remember when I was canning fruit 
how I put it boiling hot into glass jars, and put the cover 
on as quickly as I could, to keep the air out ? 

Helen: But why did you do that? 

Mother: Because there are little 
germs, or "ferments," in the air, and if 
they should get into the fruit, it would 
decay, ferment. I once had a jar of fruit 
spoil, and before I noticed it, it had 
turned to wine. In wine and cider the 
ferments are not shut out, and they make 
it "work," ferment, or turn to alcohol. 

Amy: Is beer made in the same way? 

Mother: Very much the same. When a brewer 
makes beer, he takes some corn, wheat, rye, or barley, 
puts it in a dark place, and wets it. Soon it begins to 
sprout, or grow. The grain is dead. He dries it in an 
oven to stop its growing, and the grain is then called malt. 
After this he mashes the malt, soaks it in water, and 
drains off the liquid, boils it, and puts in some yeast, 
which you know is made of millions of little ferments. 
They are like seed; and millions more grow from them. 




^Ferments. ' 



198 



The House We Live In. 




A dirty scum rises to the top, and alcohol has come to 
stay in the liquid. It is the alcohol that makes it taste 
good to those who like beer. 

Elmer : But where does alcohol like this you have 
shown us come from '^ 

Mother : By dis-til'ling wine or 
beer. 

Amv: What does "distil" mean? 
Mother : To distil means to fall 
in drops. See the drops of water gather 
and fall as I hold this glass of ice-water 
in the steam coming from the teakettle. 
The drops are distilled water. 

Helen: Is that the way they distil 
wine and beer? 
Mother: They could hardly do it in this way, but men 
found that by boiling beer or any liquid having alcohol in 
it, and letting the steam pass through a long tube called 
a "worm," they got stronger alcohol. You see the alcohol 
comes out in the steam, and as it passes through the long 
tube, or coil, it is cooled, and drops into a cask. The 
oftener it is distilled, the stronger it grows, that is, the 
more pure alcohol there is in it. 

Elmer : But why do you call alcohol a murderer ? 
Mother : Because it kills. Strong alcohol will kill 
any living thing. Dr. Richardson, of England, has said: 
**There is no animal that may not be affected by alcohol. 
A pigeon will take opium enough to kill several men, and 
receive no harm; but alcohol will poison it. A goat can 



See the drops fall. 



A Cruel Murderer. 



t99 



take enough tobacco to kill several men, but it can not 
take alcohol." 

Helen: I once read of a minister in Wales who was 
drinking in an ale-house, 

and he gave some of the \^c^^^^^^-^^ i * i^ \\m\ m\ \ \ "r^ -^^/^^^^a 
drink to a tame goat. 
The animal drank until 
it became drunk and fell 
down. The minister, 
too, became so drunk 
that he had to be car- 
ried to his home. He 
was very sick the next 
day, but the third day 
he again went to the 
ale-house and began 
drinking. The goat was 
there, and he offered it 
more ale, but it would 
not touch it. When the 
minister saw that a goat 
was wiser than himself, 
he was so ashamed that he gave up drinking. 

Mother : That was a sensible goat surely. There are 
many stories which might be told about animals that have 
drunk alcohol, but, having learned its effect, would never 
touch it again. It is a pity men are not as wise. 

Amy : I do like stories, mother. Won't you tell us 
one, please? 




The goat would not touch it. 



200 



The House We Live In, 




Mother: Here is a picture taken from life. This coon 
is trying to get a drink of beer. A coon, like a man who 
gets an appetite for strong drink, will do almost anything 

to satisfy his taste. I once read 
of a man who had two tame 
coons. One, I am glad to say, 
was a temperance coon, and, 
though his owner had barrels 
of beer, he never tried to get 
a drink. The other by tasting 
learned to like beer, and he 
would do many strange tricks 
to get it. One of his tricks 
was to go to a beer barrel, and 
when he had partly unscrewed 
the tap, he would lie on his 
back under it and drink till he was dead drunk. 

Elmer: I should think that was bad enouo^h for a 
coon; he did not have as much sense as the goat; but 
I think it is very much worse when a man fills himself 
with beer. 

Percy: But, mother, how do we know that alcohol is 
a poison? 

Mother: By the results which come from using it. 
Its first effect is to make the body feel warm, and the 
extra blood sent to a man's brain makes him sing, talk, 
and feel very gay. He says things he would be ashamed 
to say if sober. He thinks he is rich when he is poor, 
and that he is very strong when he is really weaker than 



This coon is trying to get a 
drink of beer. 



A Cruel Murderer. 



20I 



before. If he drinks still 
more, his feet begin to go 
wrong; but I need not 
tell you how a drunken 
man walks. 

Amy: He staggers. 

Mother: Now let us 
see why he staggers. The 
poison in the drink he has 
taken has put his small 
brain and the cord in his 
spinal column to sleep. 
As they control the legs 
and the feet, he stumbles 
along, and wonders why 
the sidewalk is so narrow 
and crooked, and why 
he can not go where he 
wishes to. This is the 
second effect. 

If you should hold 
a little alcohol in your 
mouth a few minutes, it 
would feel numb. That 
is because the nerves in 
the mouth and tongue 
are put to sleep so they 
can not taste or feel. If 
the man takes still more 




202 The House We Live In. 

drink, all his brain goes to sleep. When men are drunk., 
the nerves all over the body are asleep, so they do not 
know when they are in danger. A man may fall down 
on a railroad track, and he will not hear the train coming 
which will crush him to death. He may walk off into 
a river from a bridge; but he sees no danger in taking 
the step. He does terrible things that he would never 
think of doing if he had not taken this poison. He will 
beat his wife, kill his children, or he may commit other 
crimes that will cause him to be taken to prison. When 
the effect of the poison has passed, sometimes he remem- 
bers nothing that he has done, and knows not when he 
came or why he is there. 

Elmer: I should think men would know better than 
to take so much drink. 

Mother: There is no safety in even tasting it. When 
once this murderer has them in its grasp, they have no 
power to help themselves. One glass calls for two; two 
must be followed by four. The awful craving can not be 
satisfied till the man can drink no more. 

Helen: But proper food and drink do not make us 
feel that way. If I eat two potatoes to-day, I don't want 
six to-morrow ; or if I take two glasses of milk or water, 
it does not make me thirsty so I want four more. 

Mother: That is true; and it shows that alcohol is 
neither food nor drink. It is only such poisons as alcohol, 
tobacco, opium, and those related to them, that create such an 
appetite. Alcohol finally brings its victim to the last stage. 

Amy: What is that? 



A Cruel Murderer. 203 

Mother: The man becomes *'dead drunk." He is 
not quite dead, but he is next door to it. He can not 
feel, hear, or see. His body is cold, much like a corpse. 
If it were not for his heavy breathing, we would say he is 
dead. Every part of the man he himself can control, has 
been handed over to the murderer, alcohol. But his faith- 
ful heart stands by him still. It suffers, too, but with pain- 
ful effort it slowly beats, and the air comes and goes in 
gasps. 

Amy: And does he gets well.^ 

Mother: Sometimes, and at other times he really 
dies. It is an awful sight when a man by his own act 
brings himself so near to death. Not long ago I read of 
a young man in this town who drank until he became 
dead drunk. His friends who were with him put him in 
an old shed, and in the morning he was found dead. This 
murderer alcohol had gained one more victim. But there 
are other things this murderer brings to men. A doctor 
was talking not long ago to a crowd of school-children, 
and he asked them what would finally come to a man 
if he kept on drinking. 

''He will have the D. T.'s," shouted one boy. 

Percy: What did he mean by ''D. T.'s," mother.? 

Mother : He meant de-lir'i-um tre'mens. 

Helen: What is that? 

Mother: It is a sickness caused by alcohol. You have 
sometimes had bad dreams when asleep; but in this disease 
the man has dreadful dreams when he is awake. He 
thinks snakes and other creatures are crawling over him. 



204 The House We Live In. 

I once saw a little boy, not over ten years old, the son 
of a drunkard, who had had de-lir'i-um tre'mens. He had 
his father's craving for strong ' drink ; for a boy's head 
inside is often like the father's, just as his hair, eyes, and 
features are like his. 

Elmer: What a dreadful thing alcohol must be! 

Mother: But it is guilty of other wrongs than these. 
Nearly all the people who go to the insane asylums are 
sent there by it. It fills the prisons with men and women, 
because it makes them unsafe to go free. It sends people 
to the poor-house, and brings poverty, sickness, distress, 
and broken hearts to thousands of people. No tongue can 
tell the misery, sorrow, suffering, and agony it brings, 

Helen: And isn't more money spent for alcohol than 
for tobacco? 

Mother : Yes ; the flames rise higher from the money 
thrown into this fire than from the other. Nine hundred 
million dollars, or about one hundred and eighty-six million 
pounds, are spent each year for this murderer. Twice 
as much money is spent for alcohol as is used to buy 
bread. Just think of it! But we can not even imagine 
this great waste in money alone. Then add to that the 
sickness, tears, broken hearts, ruined homes, the many 
deaths caused by it, and we can only wonder that alcohol 
has not been banished from the world, never to return. 
It is such a monster of evil that we can not understand it. 

Percy: But, mother, if people only knew how much 
it costs, and how much harm it does, would they not let 
it alone ? 



A Cruel Murderer. 205 

Mother: Many would, and we must do all that we 
can to help and teach them. Every one who suffers from 
alcohol should have our pity. You have learned in our 
past talks how it does harm to the stomach, the liver, the 
muscles, and the lungs, and, most of all, to the brain and 
nerves. Just as this alcohol hardened the meat and ^^^, 
so alcohol works in our bodies to hurt and destroy the 
wonderful living rooms of which the body-house is made. 

Alcohol is a liar. Listen to what the wisest man who 
ever lived says about it: ''Wine is a mocker, strong drink 
is raging ; and who-so-ev'er is deceived thereby is not wise." 

Alcohol says, '' I am a food, and will make your body 
warm." 

Truth says: ''It's a lie. You do not feed any part of 
the body. It is true that you make it feel a little warmer 
for a time, because all the servants work so hard to throw 
you out; but the whole body is colder afterward than at 
first." 

Alcohol says, "I will make your body so plump and 
fat that you will look very healthy." 

Truth says: "It is true that you make the body fat. 
The liver ought to weigh about four pounds, and you have 
made, it sometimes weigh as much as fifty. The fat you 
give is disease, not strength." 

Alcohol says, " I will help you digest your food." 

Truth says, "You hinder di-ges'tion, and make the food 
unfit to make good blood." 

Alcohol says, "Let me come in, and I will make you 
merry." 



2o6 The House We Live In. 

Truth says: ''Who hath woe? who hath sorrow? whp 
hath con-ten'tions ? who hath babbhng [foolish talk] ? who 
hath wounds without cause? who hath redness of eyes? 
They that tarry long at the wine; they that go to seek 
mixed wine. Look not thou upon the wine when it is red, 
when it giveth his color in the cup, when it moveth itself 
aright. AT THE LAST IT BITETH LIKE A 
SERPENT, AND STIN'GETH LIKE AN ADDER." 

''Take a drink? No, not I! 
Reason teaches better 
Than to bind my very soul 

With a galHng fetter. 
Water, sweet and cool and free, 
Has no cruel chains for me. 

"Take a drink? No, not I! 

I have seen too many 
Foolish men by taking drinks 

Stripped of every penny. 
Water, sweet and cool and clear, 
Costs me nothing all the year. 

"Take a drink? No, never! 
By God's blessing never 
^ Will I touch, or taste, or smell, 
Henceforth and forever! 
Water, sweet and clear and cool. 
Makes no man a slave or fool." * 

— S. S. Times. 



® 



CHAPACTER 

or THE MASTER 




OTHER: We have now taken a hasty look at 
the larger rooms In the body-house. I hope 
that the short visit we have made to each will 
create in you all a wish to know more about 
them. Do not think you have learned it all; 
j?y^°I^" for we have only begun to study its beauties 

and wonders. 
Helen: But why do we need to know so much about it? 
Mother : That you may be able to care for it properly, 
and "glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which 
are God's." We are not our own, and some day we must 
give account for the way in which we have treated this holy 
temple given into our care. "Whether therefore ye eat, or 
drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God." 
The house we live in was not made for us simply to look 
at and admire its beauty. It was made to be useful, as well 
as beautiful. We have brains, to think and plan. We have 
eyes, to see what needs to be done, and ears, to hear what 
we are told to do. We have two hands, with ten fingers, 
which makes it easy for us to handle different objects; and 
they must be taught to be skilful. We also have two feet, 
to carry us wherever work needs to be done. A doll may be 
pretty, but it is not very useful, for it can not do anything. 

(207) 



2o8 The House We Live In. 

Percy: And there seems to be plenty of work to be 
done everywhere. 

Mother: There certainly is! Just think of how many 
houses must be built, how many clothes must be made, how 
many breakfasts and dinners must be cooked, how many 
schools there are to teach, how many fields to plow, sow, 
and reap, how many books and papers to be made that we 
may have something to read, and ever so many other kinds 
of work to be done to make ourselves and others comfortable 
and happy. 

Amy : Can we children help ? 

Mother: Yes, indeed; there is something for every boy 
and girl to do in lifting burdens, and making the world better 
and brighter because they have lived in it. 

Elmer: What can boys do? 

Mother : One of the best things which can be said of 
any boy is that he is a real help at home. Of course he 
should go to school and learn many things there ; but he 
should also learn to work. A boy can learn to drive a team, 
plow, hoe, plant, rake, and do the different kinds of work 
to be done on a farm or in a shop. He should learn how 
to use tools, the hammer, saw, plane, and others ; for almost 
every man at some time in his life needs to have knowledge 
of this kind. 

Percy : Should boys ever do housework, mother .'^ 

Mother: It is no disgrace to them to know how to 
wash dishes, make a bed, sweep a floor, or to set the table. 
If they can do such things they will be a help to mother as 
well as to father. They may bring in the wood and coal, 



Character of the Master. 209 

and so save many steps for mother and sister. Nothing 
that a boy can do in the house makes him unmanly. It 
rather marks as a true gentleman one who is able and 
willing to do whatever needs to be done, no matter what 
it is. There is one other thing that he should not fail 
to learn. 

Helen: What is that? 

Mother: To keep his own room in order. He should 
hang up his clothes, and have a place in which to keep his 
things, and see that they are kept there. There is no reason 
why a boy's sister should hang up his coat and hat, put away 
his books, or keep his room in order. He can do all these 
things for himself. I once went into a boy's room after he 
had dressed to go for a visit. It looked as though a small 
cyclone had passed through it. Soiled clothes were on the 
table and under the bed. A muddy boot was on a chair, 
and his jacket and trousers were thrown in a heap in a 
corner. The bed was unmade. Dirty water stood in the 
wash-basin. The comb was on the floor. All was confusion 
and disorder. A dis-or'der-ly boy makes a dis-or'der-ly man. 

Elmer : But you haven't told us what the girls should do. 

Mother : Some girls seem to think that if they can 
have a pale face, white hands, and a slender form, this makes 
them ladies. But a girl can be healthy, strong, and useful 
without being rough, coarse, or unladylike. Perhaps you 
have seen girls who thought it was all right for their mothers 
to cook, wash, scrub, and do all that must be done in a home, 
but who seemed to think that their own hands were too 
pretty and were not made to do that kind of work. Some 

L 



2IO 



The House We Live In. 



one ought to whisper to such girls that their hands are no 
better than their mother's. Their hands have ten fingers, 
just as hers have. They were made to work, just as hers 

were; and they should 
be trained to be so 
loving and helpful that 
those persons for whom 
they care most will not 
stop to ask if they are 
white or brown. 

Helen : I am not 
afraid to use my hands, 
mother. What shall 
they be taught to do.'^ 
Mother : How to 
wash, to sweep, scrub, 
cook, and sew ; how to 
make a bed, and sweep 
in the very best way ; 
how to wash and iron 
well. It may be that 
girls who do this kind 

Learning to sew. of WOrk wIU get tired, 

and their backs and arms will ache, but it will not hurt them. 
A night's sleep will rest the muscles and make them ready 
for another day's work. It Is right for girls to excel at 
school; but while studying their books, they should learn 
to be useful and lighten the burdens at home. 

Amy: But should girls work out-of-doors, mother .^^ 




Character of the Master. 2 1 1 

'Mother: If they live where they can, it is well for 
them to do so, at least to learn how to do some of the 
lighter work that comes to father and brothers. They 
should be able to milk a cow, harness a horse, make a 
garden, and do some of the lighter kinds of farm-work. 
Miss Frances Willard was taught this when a girl, and it 
proved to be a lifelong blessing. But in this, our last talk, 
we will take just a peep at the rooms in which the master 
of the body-house lives. In these rooms no one may enter 
but the master himself 

Percy: But where shall we find these rooms? 

Mother : They are in the mind. I must tell you before 
we go further that they are our thoughts. I can not tell 
what you think about, and you can not tell what is in my 
mind, only as we put our thoughts into words. I wish I 
could help every boy and girl to feel how important it is 
to have clean, good thoughts. "As he thinketh in his heart, 
so is he;" that is, a person is no better than his thoughts 
are, and he is just as good. If the thoughts are wrong, the 
person is all wrong, no matter how good he may appear 
to be. 

Helen: I found a little poem about our thoughts and 
put it in my scrap-book. May I read it, mother? 

Mother: Please do; I know we all want to hear it. 

Helen: Here it is: — 

" There were idle thoughts came in at the door, 
And warmed their Httle toes, 
And did more mischief about the house 
Than any one living knows. 



212 The House We Live In. 

' ' They scratched the tables and broke the chairs, 
And soiled the floor and wall ; 
For a motto was written above the door, 
'There's a welcome here for all.' 

"When the master saw the mischief done, 
He closed it with hope and fear, 
And he wrote above, * Let none 
Save good thoughts enter here.' 

"And the good little thoughts came trooping in. 
When he drove the others out ; 
They cleaned the walls, they swept the floor. 
And sang as they moved about. 

"And last of all an angel came, 
With a kindly, shining face, 
And above the door he wrote, ' Here 
Love has found a dwelling-place.' " 

Mother : That is very good. Let us all take for our 
motto, "Let none save good thoughts enter here." Now 
I think you understand that as we are talking of passing 
through different rooms, we mean that we are in the 
''chambers of the mind," and we imagine that we are 
looking at a person's thoughts. We will look inside of just 
a few rooms, and from them we can form an idea of the rest. 

Elmer: Where shall we go first? 

Mother : I think you will like to look in here, where 
the master keeps his pets. He is fond of birds, cats, dogs, 
and all kinds of animals; and where this room is large in 
the mind, you will find the master kind to them all. He 
will not give them pain if he can help it, and takes pleasure 
in making them happy. 



Character of the Master. 213 

Amy: I think I should Hke to visit this room often. 

Mother: In this smaller room he keeps his money. 
Sometimes this room is so small, and he cares for it so 
poorly, that he wastes about all that he gets, and keeps 
very little. In some houses this room is very large, and 
the master lives here nearly all the time. His greatest 
delight is to shut himself in and count his money over and 
over. He becomes very selfish by doing in this way, and 
he will not part with what he has either for his own comfort 
or that of others. People who have such large rooms, and 
use them in this way, are called misers. 

Percy : I don't want to be one. 

Mother: I am glad you do not. It is best to have 
only a medium-sized room of this kind. Here is the room 
where Taste sends his messages. If the room is very large, 
you may be sure that the master enjoys nothing so much 
as something good to eat. This is not a good room in 
which to spend much of one's time, though every one should 
visit it several times each day. There are quite a number 
of small rooms not far from this one. In one the master 
goes to study his a-rith'me-tic. In another, he measures 
things. In another, he has a pair of scales to weigh them. 
In another, he keeps samples of all shades of colors. But 
we can not stop in these small rooms. 

Ah, here is Memory Hall! Many persons like to spend 
most of their time here. See what a great number of 
pictures are hanging on the wall. 

Helen: O mother, let us stop and look at some of them! 

Mother : Perhaps I should first tell you that the master 



214 ^^^ House We Live In. 

of every house is all the time making pictures, whether he 
is an artist or not. His acts, good and bad, make pictures 
in the mind. When they are finished, he hangs them in this 
hall. Some are in dark corners, and he hardly ever looks 
at them after they are made ; he even forgets that he made 
them. The masters of some houses spend many happy 
hours in this hall. Others do not like to go near it. Their 
pain or pleasure depends on the kind of pictures they have 
made. I have seen some who would weep in sorrow of 
heart as they looked over the different pictures that they 
had hung there, and some they would not for anything have 
any one see. There is only One who can take away these 
sinful pictures, but He can make them white as snow. 

Elmer : Then we ought to have all our actions such 
that pleasant pictures will be hung in our hall of memory. 

Mother: I think so; but we will pass on to some of 
the higher, more important rooms. Here we find the place 
where the master receives the poor, and where his acts of 
kindness are done. In some houses this is the smallest room 
of the whole. In others, it is large and lofty, and the master 
spends much time there. He is so good and kind that people 
can not help loving him when this is the case. 

Amy: This next room looks like a church. 

Mother : We might call it the chapel ; for it is here 
that the master goes to pray, and worship God. Some use 
this room a great deal ; others, very little. It is the highest, 
best room in the house, and the master ought to visit it many 
times each day. 

Percy: And what is this large room? 



Character of the Master. 2 1 5 

Mother: This is where the master thinks things over, 
and "makes up his mind," as we say. This is the "will" 
room; that is, the person decides what he will or will not 
do. This is an important room indeed. It is a good thing 
to have a good, strong will if we only will to do the right 
thing, for it helps any one in doing right; but if he is 
doing wrong, it causes him to do more wrong. 

To show what I mean, we will say that a man who has 
been drinking beer or cider learns that the reason he likes 
these drinks is because there is alcohol in them, and he sees 
that they will do him harm, and that the more he drinks 
them, the more he will want them. He doesn't want weak 
muscles, a bloated body, a fatty liver, or a weak brain and 
nerves. He does not wish to go to the insane asylum, to 
the jail, to the poor-house, or into a drunkard's grave. But 
he likes the alcohol. It is hard to give it up, and his friends 
will call him a "temperance man," and will jeer at him, and 
say that he is a coward. Now what will he do? He goes 
into his "will room," and he says to himself: "I have been 
a slave long enough. From now on I will be master of 
this body-house. It makes no difference how loudly Taste 
may call, nor how badly I want him to have his own way, 
I WILL NOT give up, God helping me, and I am going 
to put my will on the right side of this question." 

Elmer: Couldn't he overcome any other bad habit in 
just the same way? 

Mother: Yes; whether he wants food that is not good, 
or too much of that which is good ; whether he wishes to 
leave off using tobacco, or other bad habits of any kind, 



2i6 The House We Live In. 

when he gets his will on the right side, the battle is more 
than half over. 

Amy: Then a person can not have too much will. 

Mother: Not if he wills to do right; but if he places 
his will on the wrong side, it is a sad thing. Sometimes 
he wills to have his own way, no matter how it may affect 
himself or others, and that is bad for him and for his friends. 

Here is a room where the master measures people. 
We can imagine that they stand about like statues, and 
some he places high in his esteem, and the others lower 
down. I think about the worst thing he could do would 
be to place himself higher than any one else. Boys and 
girls are sometimes in danger of doing this, even thinking 
that they know more than their father and mother. It is 
well to have a fair-sized room of this kind, but bad to 
have one which is large. We shall not have time to visit 
more of the rooms to be found in the mind, though there 
are many others that we might visit. 

Helen: I wish we might hear about all of them. 

Mother: You may, as you grow older. You must 
be very careful to have the master of your own house live 
in the best and highest rooms. Strange as it may seem, 
yet it is true that the rooms he stays in most will grow 
larger the more they are used. Some live in the lower, 
poorer rooms all their lives. The people we love best 
spend most of their time in the highest rooms. 

Percy: Is there any way by which we can tell where 
the master spends most of his time? 

Mother- Yes; clean, kind thoughts make marks on 



Character of the Master. 2 1 7 

our faces, and wicked, cruel thoughts leave their print also. 
Our thoughts pull up or draw down the corners of the 
mouth, and they make little wrinkles under the eyes and in 
the forehead. Sometimes they make little holes in the 
cheeks, which we call dimples. If our thoughts are kind, 
pleasant, happy thoughts, they draw the corners of the 
mouth upward ; the wrinkles are smoothed out of the 
forehead, and there are some merry ones which gather 
round the eyes and make the face look so pleasant that we 
want to get near its owner and become better acquainted. 

Amy: I didn't know that our thoughts looked out in 
our faces. 

Mother: If either good or bad thoughts come to live 
in your mind all the time, they will print themselves on 
your face and change your looks. The good thoughts 
will make your face beautiful, though your hair may be as 
straight as an Indian's, your nose crooked, and your mouth 
large. On the other hand, though your hair may curl, 
your skin be as fair as a peach blossom, your features 
be perfect, yet if you let bad thoughts live in the mind, 
your face will no longer look lovely to others. It is only 
a kind, unselfish heart that can give true beauty. 

Helen: I have often wished that I might be pretty, 
like some of the girls at school, but I know now how to 
be lovable if I am not beautiful. 

Mother: There are a few other things which will 
help you to have a good-looking face. First, keep it 
clean. Then the next thing is to eat good food, that 
you may have a clear, healthy skin and bright eyes. You 



2i8 The House We Live In. 

should also be careful to brush your teeth, that these little 
guards may always be dressed in the cleanest of white 
uniforms. Then keep your hair in good order. Brush it 
often, and keep the whole head sweet and clean. If you 
do these things, you will always be pleasant to look at. 

I was reading not long ago about a little girl who was 
told of the wrinkles that smiles leave on our faces, and 
the wrinkles that scowls leave, as well as those left by 
pain, thought, and care. The child listened, and then said 
brightly, "My grandma has lots of wrinkles, but they're all 
smile wrinkles, every one of themr 

So, my children, as the days pass by, see that your 
mind is pleasant, and your body-temple kept clean and 
pure. Thus you will live useful lives, and be a blessing to 
yourselves and others. 

"If I knew the box where the smiles are kept, 

No matter how large the key 
Or strong the bolt, I would try so hard, 

'Twould open, I know, for me. 
Then over the land and the sea, broadcast, 

I'd scatter the smiles to play, 
That the children's faces might hold them fast 

For many and many a day. 

*Tf I knew a box that was large enough 

To hold all the frowns I meet, 
I would like to gather them every one. 

From nursery, school, and street; 
Then, folding and holding, I'd pack them in. 

And, turning the monster key, 
I'd hire a giant to drop the box 

To the depth of the deep, deep sea." 



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